Four directors to leave ENRC
KEN Olisa, one of two directors yesterday voted off the board of resources group ENRC after voicing corporate governance concerns at the FTSE 100 company, said the firm must be “pretty vulnerable” to an investigation by the UK listing authorities.
Olisa told City A.M.: “When we went public the people selling shares made commitments that they would not get involved in the running of the company.”
He added that the shares market now would decide “whether it wants to invest in a company which is so clearly in the orbit of its controlling shareholders”.
Olisa was removed from the board along with City grandee Sir Richard Sykes after a vote by shareholders. The group is still controlled by its majority Kazakh shareholders, who voted against Olisa and Sykes. Two other directors are understood to have stepped down.
The board of ENRC has been the subject of repeated reports of internal disagreements, particularly after a controversial deal last year involving the purchase of a disputed licence to mine copper in the Democratic Republic of Congo, which is still the subject of a legal dispute. The group launched a “comprehensive” corporate governance review.