O’Brien ambushes board of IN&M at group’s AGM

ONE of the country’s richest entrepreneurs, Denis O’Brien, continued his assault on Independent News & Media (IN&M) at the group’s annual general meeting held in Belfast yesterday.

His nominee, Andrew Clearfield, one of three nominees he had at the AGM, said the board was more appropriate to a company operating in 1967 than in 2007.

His comments followed the publication of report commissioned by Mr O’Brien that described the board as “crony” and seriously lacking independence.

Four directors, or one fifth, were members of the O’Reilly family, while others were close to Tony O’Reilly or interconnected with each other.

Of the 14 non-executive directors, “none of them” were found by five proxy advisory services to be independent, he said.

Former Canadian prime minister, Brian Mulroney, chairman of the nomination and corporate governance committee at IN&M, hit back at the allegations and condemned the report which he said was incorrect in several instances.

In recent weeks the group responded to seven different letters from Mr O’Brien containing 42 issues about the group.

“All were dismissed because there was not a scintilla of evidence anywhere to sustain even the most remote allegation of misconduct anywhere in INM,” Mr Mulroney said.

He added that under company law it was within the “purview” of the board to determine the independence of directors, which it concluded “can be readily justified”.

He said the report incorrectly stated he was a director of the Avis Budget Group and so needed to be treated with great caution.

On the other controversial issue of additional payments to directors it emerged Mr Mulroney was paid €100,000 for being the “eyes and ears” of IN&M Canada, Africa and the US.

Other directors including Senator Maurice Hayes were also paid additional sums it was disclosed yesterday. All payments were justified on the basis of additional services given by each director to the company.