Aspers quit Canwest board
Indication family no longer controls media firm
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 11/02/2010 (5873 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
David and Gail Asper have resigned from the board of directors of Canwest Global Communications, the once-great media company their father, Izzy, founded in Winnipeg in the late ’70s.
Their departure is a formal indication the Asper family no longer controls the company.
When the parent company was placed in court protection in early October, it was announced debt holders would take over ownership.
The Asper family holdings in Canwest will shrink from about 56 per cent to a little more than one per cent. Canwest is in the midst of two separate court-supervised restructuring proceedings after failing to keep up with massive debt servicing costs on close to $4 billion it owed.
Bondholders are restructuring the parent company, including its stable of speciality channels and the Global Television network, and a separate process is underway that is seeking a buyer for its 10 metropolitan newspapers and 11 community papers.
“This should come as no particular surprise,” said one observer familiar with Canwest’s governance history. “The company is being restructured. There will be a different board going forward, whether it happens today, two weeks from today or two months from today. It is an inexorable part of the process.”
Lisa Pankratz, president of Mackenzie Cundill Investment Management Ltd., also resigned from the board.
A corporate release cited the three departing board members’ “desires to pursue other business commitments and charitable initiatives as well as to assist the company’s efforts to reduce the size of its board.”
Leonard Asper, David and Gail’s younger brother, remains CEO of Canwest and continues to sit on the board of directors.
Both David and Gail Asper had been on the board since 1992. Gail also served as its corporate secretary until January 2008. She is president of the Asper Foundation and national campaign chair for Friends of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, spearheading development of the new national museum in Winnipeg.
David Asper has held various positions at the company since 1989, including executive vice-president of Canwest and chairman of the National Post. He is an assistant professor of law at the University of Manitoba and executive chairman of Creswin Properties Inc.
martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca