| Mikhail Khodorkovsky asks to fire Viktor Gerashchenko from Yukos for his inability to negotiate with the government Viktor Gerashchenko did not live up to the hopes placed on him by the disgraced shareholders of YUKOS. During the three weeks that he spent in the chair of the chairman of the company's board of directors, he failed to establish contact with the authorities and achieve a deferment in paying the company's debt to the state.
Yesterday, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, through his lawyer Anton Drel, conveyed a request to the company’s shareholders to consider the issue of Mr. Gerashchenko’s resignation from his post, since “officials refuse to meet with the board of directors.” “Moreover, informed persons claim that the continued presence of Mr. Gerashchenko on the board of directors limits the dialogue, and there are no other ideas to resolve the situation other than negotiations with the government,” the lawyer said.
According to Mr. Drel, the disgraced oligarch, through his defenders, appealed to Mr. Gerashchenko with a request to resign on July 5. “Since for certain reasons such a decision was not made, Mr. Khodorkovsky will ask to resolve this issue at the general meeting of Yukos shareholders,” Mr. Drel said. By the way, exactly a week ago the State Duma prematurely terminated the powers of deputy Viktor Gerashchenko, elected to parliament from the Rodina bloc. Mr. Gerashchenko renounced his deputy mandate just after his election to the board of directors of the YUKOS company.
From Viktor Gerashchenko, since the state did not give Yukos a deferment on its debts, they expected that he would at least not allow the sale of the holding’s mining assets. After all, when candidates for the YUKOS board of directors were confirmed at the end of April, Mr. Gerashchenko was considered by investors and shareholders as a political heavyweight, close to the authorities and capable of saving the company. Moreover, he constantly stated that he had developed a plan to resolve the situation with the company. True, he never provided details. However, after the meeting of YUKOS shareholders on June 24, it became clear that there was no plan at all - there were only purely declarative intentions to negotiate with the state.
And literally the next day after the bailiffs’ visit to YUKOS and the seizure of the company’s accounts, the chairman of the board of directors specially met with journalists and made a number of loud statements. “Proceeds from sales come to these accounts and payments are made through them, including to the customs service for pumping oil. If the accounts are under arrest with a collection demand, then the company simply cannot do anything,” he said. At the same time, Mr. Gerashchenko said that “he called Dmitry Medvedev (head of the presidential administration - Ed. ) and Mikhail Fradkov, told them about the current situation.” However, none of the officials began to talk with the new Yukos manager. “I left a message with their secretaries, but they did not call,” Mr. Gerashchenko noted. This “did not call back” obviously contained a manifestation of the inability of the former head of the Central Bank to find a solution to the “YUKOS problem.” It is unlikely that Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who has already proposed to transfer his 44 percent stake in the company free of charge to the state to settle debt claims against Yukos, needs an intermediary to whom key government officials “do not call back.”
Now the ex-deputy and ex-head of the Central Bank has two options: agree with Mr. Khodorkovsky’s proposal and leave of his own free will, or wait until he is forcibly removed. As Eldar Nazmutdinov, senior legal adviser at the Prospekt investment company, notes, in order to re-elect the board of directors, the current board must convene an extraordinary meeting of shareholders, and this will happen in three months at best. But if Mr. Gerashchenko voluntarily resigns, the council will not have to be re-elected - its composition will simply be reduced by one person, and a new chairman will be elected from among the remaining ten.
It was impossible to get comments from Mr. Gerashchenko himself yesterday. Group MENATEP also did not comment on Mr. Khodorkovsky’s statements. And YUKOS refused to talk about the plans of the company’s shareholders. Denis REBROV |
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