Refusing to take into account the vote of the two representatives of Xavier Niel, the board of directors of the Marseille daily newspaper gave his approval to the shipowner.
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Two voices to zero. The Board of Directors of Provence, which normally has five members, has approved in a baroque and unexpected manner the redemption offer proposed by the shipowner CMA CGM during a stormy meeting, Monday, May, at the Marseille headquarters of the press group. Referring to the presence of a conflict of interest concerning the two administrators representing Avenir Development, property of NJJ, the holding company of Xavier Niel (shareholder on an individual basis of the world), also candidate for the buyout, the president and chief executive officer of Provence, Jean-Christophe Serfati, refused to take into account their votes which opposed the CMA CGM project. He also refused to count the voting delegation of the fifth administrator, Stéphane Tapie, who, absent, had given power to the representative of Mr. Niel, Anthony Maarek, to oppose the offer of the shipowner. >
According to Mr. Serfati, the son of Bernard Tapie, representing the group Bernard Tapie (GBT), could not validly give proxy to an administrator representing another shareholder. This surprise procedure, carried out in the presence of the two judicial liquidators of GBT, allowed the CEO of Provence, also chairman of the board of directors, to announce at the end of the afternoon on the forecourt of the company that the ‘Rodolphe Saadé’s 81 million euros recovery offer, the owner of CMA CGM, had just been validated. His vote and that of the secretary general of Provence, Virginie Layani, who recently replaced Franz-Olivier Giesbert on the board of directors, were enough to tip the decision.
A procedure immediately contested in a press release by NJJ which evokes “a rude force” and makes a very different voting calculation: “The majority of administrators have not approved this transfer project, which makes it lapsed “. The representatives of Xavier Niel also denounced the presence in Marseille of the lawyer Nicolas Molfessis, professor at the University of Paris-Ii-Panthéon-Assas, who, in the preamble, presented the risks of conflict of interests run by the representatives of NJJJ .
“A long and difficult wait for employees”
Since its tower located a few hundred meters away, the presidency of the CMA CGM praised the decision of the board of directors of Provence to accept “unanimously” its offer. The company of Rodolphe Saadé takes care, however, that “the administrators representing the minority shareholder could not validly express their vote”. “This puts an end to a long and difficult wait for employees whose representatives wanted the approval of the CMA CGM,” said the Marseille company. The shipowner has already stopped a calendar over thirty-six months to launch its plan at 50 million euros intended to relaunch a newspaper that loses readers each year. On March 24, the six CSEs of Provence and Corsica morning, representing the group’s 850 employees, gave a favorable opinion to this investment plan.
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