Monday, 23 May 2016
On April 18, 2016 CIMB announced:
".... that Dato’ Sri Nazir Razak will take a voluntary leave of absence from his positions as Chairman of CIMB Group and Director of CIMB Bank, with effect from close of business today till the completion of an ongoing Board review on the banking activities relating to his personal account".
In these kind of CG cases it is important that the independent directors step up their game, and show their independence. They have to tackle the issues at hand from all different directions in an unbiased way.
However, in this case it looks like they had made up their mind already. Before the board review had even started the senior independent director stated:
"... the members have always been convinced that he upholds the highest standards of corporate governance. While this decision [to take leave of absence] of his is contrary to the Board's wishes ..."
On May 18, 2016 CIMB announced:
Dato’ Sri Nazir Razak did not misuse his position as the Group Chief Executive at that time nor was there any inappropriate use of the bank’s resources.
That might have been the case, but first of all more details regarding this would have been welcome.
Secondly there are many other issues (legal, ethical, moral etc.) involved, but the announcement does not touch on those.
The announcement continues:
".... the detailed examinations conducted during the review identified some process shortcomings,"
Again, there is no explanation whatsoever what those "process shortcomings" are.
".... that Dato’ Sri Nazir Razak will take a voluntary leave of absence from his positions as Chairman of CIMB Group and Director of CIMB Bank, with effect from close of business today till the completion of an ongoing Board review on the banking activities relating to his personal account".
In these kind of CG cases it is important that the independent directors step up their game, and show their independence. They have to tackle the issues at hand from all different directions in an unbiased way.
However, in this case it looks like they had made up their mind already. Before the board review had even started the senior independent director stated:
"... the members have always been convinced that he upholds the highest standards of corporate governance. While this decision [to take leave of absence] of his is contrary to the Board's wishes ..."
On May 18, 2016 CIMB announced:
Dato’ Sri Nazir Razak did not misuse his position as the Group Chief Executive at that time nor was there any inappropriate use of the bank’s resources.
That might have been the case, but first of all more details regarding this would have been welcome.
Secondly there are many other issues (legal, ethical, moral etc.) involved, but the announcement does not touch on those.
The announcement continues:
".... the detailed examinations conducted during the review identified some process shortcomings,"
Again, there is no explanation whatsoever what those "process shortcomings" are.
CIMB (1023): which process shortcomings? - M.A. Wind
