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Prime Minister Howard at war with Telstra
Stuart Corner
Tuesday, 26 September 2006 07:43
Page 1 of 2
Just when you thought relations between the Telstra board and management and the Government could get no worse, they have. Much worse.
The Government has unilaterally proposed its own board candidate, former Optus Vision CEO, Geoff Cousins, confident that its majority shareholding will enable it to get him onto the board and the Telstra Board has very publicly rejected him outright.
Opposition communications spokesman Stephen Conroy branded the move "a disgrace and a scandal," and "political thuggery" saying: "The Telstra board are entitled to feel aggrieved, they have corporate governance procedures, they have board search procedures, they have proper process and John Howard has just said 'I don't care about any of that I want my mate on the board and I want to be able to put pressure on Telstra's Board whenever I want."
According to Conroy, the move "breaches all of the corporate governance guidelines for appointments of directors, it breaches the ASX and IFSA Investment and Financial Services Association Limited guidelines."
The decision could not have been more politically disastrous nor its timing worse: the vote to elect Cousins will take place at Telstra's AGM on November 14 in the midst of the T3 sale process.
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