Bid to stop Irish Press chairman's re-election fails

Angry Irish Press plc shareholders tried to block the re-election of chairman, Mr Vincent Jennings, to the company's board at its annual meeting yesterday.

The company's board, represented yesterday by Mr Jennings and Dr Eamon de Valera, proposed the former's re-election to the meeting.

Shareholder Mr Michael O'Connor, however, called on the meeting to reject his re-election.

Mr O'Connor said the management had brought the company from a leading newspaper group to its current position, where its main interests were Thom's Dublin Street Directory and a majority shareholding in Tipperary radio station, Tipp FM. "For the last 20 years the management of this company has been a disaster," Mr O'Connor declared.

Following a show of hands indicating that a majority of those who attended the meeting opposed Mr Jennings' re-election, the issue went to a poll. The motion to re-elect the chairman was carried by 484,061 shares to 1,481. Dr de Valera's 464,795 shares accounted for the bulk of the support for Mr Jennings' re-appointment to the board.

The poll was one of three held at the meeting. The results of the other votes were similarly skewed. The meeting nominated shareholder Mr John Power as a director, but the board opposed this. The motion to appoint him to the board was supported by a majority at the meeting, but was defeated by 483,133 shares to 2,619 after a poll was taken.

Earlier in the meeting, a number of shareholders tried to force the board to adjourn the annual meeting, so the company could examine a number of questions raised at the meeting about Dr de Valera's shareholding. This was defeated by 484,232 shares to 10,825.

Responding to a number of questions from shareholder Mr Neil Duggan, Dr de Valera said he held the financial benefits from a substantial majority of the shares registered to him on trust for "another company". After the meeting, he confirmed to The Irish Times that the other company was the American-registered Irish Press Corporation.

He also told the meeting that a large number of his shares were held jointly with Mr Colm Traynor, a former director of a number of the group's companies.

According to Mr Duggan, Dr de Valera's stake is rooted in an option to take up 17,895 shares granted jointly to Mr Vivian de Valera and his fellow director, Mr Seán Nunan, in 1966, which was taken up in 1973. Shareholders wanted the board to examine the circumstances surrounding this.

At the end of last year, €536,000 was wiped off the value of quoted investments held by the company, while it made a loss of €587,000 in the nine months to between the end of March and December 2002. The board yesterday refused to say what investments had cost it €536,000.

The meeting approved a dividend of 25 cents a share, and directors' pay of €12,500 each. The directors also fixed auditors' fees for 2003 at €27,000.

The group's auditor, Deloitte and Touche, will receive around €15,000, according to Dr de Valera. Tipp FM's auditors, Gilligan and Co of Clonmel, will receive part of the rest, while Roland, auditors to Irish Press plc's Jersey-based subsidiary, Profinance Ltd, will also be paid from this sum.