resignation

Mikhail Beketov, Russian Journalist Beaten in 2008, Dies

April 9, 2013 by NewsMaker Leave a Comment

After Mr. Beketov had called for the resignation of the municipal government in the city of Khimki, where he lived, his car was blown up. He later wrote about that in his newspaper, as well, and then was beaten so severely that he spent the rest of his life using a wheelchair, unable to form sentences. Three of his fingers and one of his legs had to be amputated.

The police barely investigated the crime, ignoring witnesses who came forward offering information and surveillance videos that could have identified Mr. Beketov’s assailants. By then, Mr. Beketov had become a hero to many and the recipient of several journalism prizes, including one bestowed by the state.

Yevgenia Chirikova, an environmental activist from Khimki, said Mr. Beketov, who was 55 when he died, never recovered from the attack.

“In essence, they killed him back then,” she said in a telephone interview. “He was just dying all these years. That’s all.”

Yelena Kostuchenko, a journalist and friend, told the Committee to Protect Journalists that Mr. Beketov choked on a piece of food at lunch on Monday, which she linked to deep tracheal scarring that he sustained after the attack.

Mr. Beketov used his own money to finance the publication of a newspaper, Khimkinskaya Pravda, which had a circulation of about 10,000. He wrote scathingly about plans to build a major highway through the Khimki Forest, and of a decision to move a monument to servicemen killed in World War II. In May 2007, someone beat his dog to death and set his car on fire.

Mr. Beketov told journalists he suspected the mayor, Vladimir Strelchenko, but the case was closed shortly thereafter for lack of evidence. Months later, Mr. Beketov was still writing: “Last spring, I called for the resignation of the city’s leadership. A few days later, my automobile was blown up. What is next for me?”

Before he was attacked, Mr. Beketov had warned Ms. Chirikova that something might happen to him, and told her the police should “look in the Khimki administration.” But investigators eventually suspended the investigation for a lack of evidence.

“The fact that the mastermind of this crime has never been punished, that means that they simply don’t want to look for him,” she said. “They know exactly who did it.”

Mr. Strelchenko, who said he played no role in the attack, won a slander case against Mr. Beketov in 2010, when the journalist was unable to speak or walk. He remained mayor of Khimki for four years, stepping down for what the authorities said were unrelated reasons.

Ms. Chirikova said she was never sure whether Mr. Beketov understood that the mayor had left office.

Municipal authorities in Khimki announced Monday that they would assist in arranging Mr. Beketov’s burial.

In comments to the Interfax news service, Lyudmila M. Alekseyeva, the head of the Moscow Helsinki Group, hailed the “tenacity and heroism with which he defended the dignity and rights of citizens, despite his grave physical condition.”

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/09/world/europe/mikhail-beketov-russian-journalist-beaten-in-2008-dies.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Media Business Tagged With: car on fire, journalist, resignation

Lockheed’s Incoming Chief Forced Out Over Ethics Violation

November 10, 2012 by NewsMaker Leave a Comment

The official, Christopher E. Kubasik, 51, was vice chairman, president and chief operating officer of Lockheed, the world’s largest military contractor. He was to become chief executive on Jan. 1.

Robert J. Stevens, Lockheed’s current chief executive, told reporters that an employee had tipped off the company two weeks ago to Mr. Kubasik’s relationship with another employee. Mr. Stevens said an investigation by outside lawyers had confirmed the assertion, which violated company ethics codes, and led the board to demand his resignation on Friday.

Citing privacy concerns, Mr. Stevens would not disclose details of Mr. Kubasik’s relationship. But Loren Thompson, a military analyst and consultant to Lockheed, said that Mr. Kubasik, who is married, had been involved in a long-standing relationship with a female employee who has since left the company.

Lockheed’s board selected a longtime company executive, Marillyn A. Hewson, to replace Mr. Kubasik as president and chief operating officer now and to become chief executive on Jan. 1.

Mr. Kubasik’s dismissal comes at a crucial time for Lockheed and the military contracting industry in general, as President Obama and Republican leaders in Congress begin to look at ways to cut the federal budget. Military spending, which surged after the 2001 terrorist attacks, has already begun to slow, and Lockheed and other military companies have laid off thousands of workers and are consolidating operations to deal with what Mr. Stevens calls “the new reality.”

Mr. Kubasik’s departure also represents a significant change in what had been a long-anticipated succession at the top of Lockheed. He was considered the heir apparent to Mr. Stevens after forging a strong relationship with Wall Street as Lockheed’s chief financial officer from 2001 to 2007. He was known for his intelligence as well as his sharp and acerbic wit, but within the company, Mr. Thompson said, those characteristics had begun to grate on co-workers. “His sarcasm was less welcome as he rose to one of the top positions in the company,” Mr. Thompson said.

Mr. Kubasik said in a statement, “I regret that my conduct in this matter did not meet the standards to which I have always held myself.”

He earned more than $9.4 million in total compensation in 2011 and could have received substantially more as chief executive. Mr. Stevens earned about $25 million last year. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission late Friday, Lockheed said Mr. Kubasik would receive a $3.5 million separation payment, but would not be entitled to his bonus for 2012. His bonus last year was $2.275 million.

Mr. Stevens, 61, has been Lockheed’s chief executive since 2004 and is retiring from that role.

The board said that Mr. Stevens’s title would shift to “executive chairman” on Jan. 1, signifying that he would play a more active, day-to-day advisory role in 2013 to help Ms. Hewson in her transition. Mr. Stevens said the company had a deep enough bench of executives that he felt comfortable planning to retire from that new role at the end of next year.

Mr. Thompson said that Mr. Stevens, who had brought the company back from financial difficulties, had had enough of dealing with the Pentagon and Congress over problematic acquisition programs and did not want to stay longer.

Ms. Hewson “is unfailingly polite and gracious,” Mr. Thompson said, “and her personality may be better suited than Mr. Kubasik’s to interacting with the government.” In a statement Friday, Mr. Stevens said, “While I am deeply disappointed and saddened by Chris’s actions, which have been inconsistent with our values and standards, our swift response to his improper conduct demonstrates our unyielding commitment to holding every employee accountable for their actions.”

Lockheed, based in Bethesda, Md., has about 120,000 employees and had sales of $46.5 billion last year. It makes the F-35 and other fighter planes, satellites and missile defense systems and provides information technology and security services to government agencies.

Mr. Kubasik had been promoted to president and chief operating officer in April. It was also announced then that he would succeed Mr. Stevens on Jan. 1.

Ms. Hewson, 58, has been an executive vice president in charge of the company’s electronic systems business since January 2010. The board had also decided in April that she would move up to president and chief operating officer when Mr. Kubasik replaced Mr. Stevens.

Ms. Hewson will join Linda Hudson of BAE Systems and Phebe Novakovic, who will become chief executive of General Dynamics in January, in the rarefied world of women who run major military companies.

Ms. Hewson was born in Junction City, Kan., and her father died when she was 9. Her mother, with three of her five children, moved to Alabama, to be near relatives who could help her. Ms. Hewson earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration and a master’s in economics from the University of Alabama and has been with Lockheed Martin since 1983. She has since had 18 management jobs at the company. She has a husband and two sons and said she moved her family eight times along the way.

She once told Fortune that when she interviewed for her first job at Lockheed, in Marietta, Ga., she loved seeing all the planes in the factory. After that, “I never really wanted to work anywhere else,” she said.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/10/business/lockheed-citing-ethics-violation-says-incoming-chief-has-quit.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Business News Tagged With: loren thompson, resignation, vice chairman

Ousted Olympus Chief Accuses the Company of Fraud

October 17, 2011 by NewsMaker Leave a Comment

The executive, Michael Woodford, was in London on Monday where he delivered a dossier of what he called “condemning” evidence on Olympus to Britain’s Serious Fraud Office.

Mr. Woodford, 51, said he confronted the Olympus chairman, Tsuyoshi Kikukawa, last week with a report he had commissioned from the accounting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers, which he said raised questions about almost $700 million in payments that Olympus had made to financial advisers over an acquisition in 2008.

The PriceWaterhouseCoopers report says that improper conduct could not be ruled out. Mr. Woodford said that he had demanded Mr. Kikukawa’s resignation, only to have the chairman convene a board meeting on Friday in which Mr. Woodford, the only non-Japanese executive among the 15 directors, was fired.

“I’d be delighted to return and put in a new management structure,” Mr. Woodford said Monday during a telephone interview from London. “But with or without me, the board should all go.”

Olympus denied any wrongdoing and declined to make Mr. Kikukawa available for an interview.

Mr. Woodford, a 30-year Olympus veteran, had been president since April and added the chief executive’s post in September.

He said he had also made enquiries into Olympus’s acquisition in 2008 of three small Japanese companies unrelated to Olympus’s core businesses for almost $600 million. Those investments were written down to only a quarter of their value within the same fiscal year, he said.

In all, the transactions he is questioning resulted in the destruction of $1.3 billion in shareholder value at Olympus, a maker of cameras and medical equipment, Mr. Woodford said. The transactions, he said, occurred under Mr. Kikukawa, who preceded him as chief executive before becoming chairman.

“Olympus needs a complete and utter forensic accounting,” Mr. Woodford said. “To be that incompetent is difficult to imagine, which suggests that there is something more sinister going on.”

Yoshiaki Yamada, a spokesman in Tokyo for Olympus, maintained Monday that Mr. Woodford had been stripped of his title because his leadership style had created “a big gap” with the rest of management, which was “inhibiting decision-making.”

“All of our mergers and acquisitions have been carried out with proper accounting, and through appropriate procedures and processes,” Mr. Yamada said.

Mr. Woodford’s allegations were first reported by the Financial Times.

Since Mr. Woodford’s dismissal on Friday, Olympus has lost more than $3 billion in market capitalization. The stock sank 22 percent in Tokyo on Monday after losing 18 percent on Friday, when the company fired Mr. Woodford.

Mr. Woodford said the transactions first came to his attention in late July, when an article in the Japanese finance magazine Facta raised questions about Olympus’s acquisition of the three Japanese companies. But when Mr. Woodford asked Mr. Kikukawa about the article over lunch in early August, he said the chairman told him it was “a domestic situation” that the Briton need not worry about.

Mr. Woodford said he sent a copy of the PriceWaterhouseCoopers report to Mr. Kikukawa last week, along with a letter in which Mr. Woodford called the transactions “shameful” and called for the resignations of the chairman and two other executives. He said he also sent the report to all members of the Olympus board and suggested to Mr. Kikukawa that they meet Friday to discuss “where we go from here.”

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/18/business/global/ousted-olympus-chief-accuses-the-company-of-fraud.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: financial advisers, resignation, telephone interview

DealBook: Buffett’s Ruthlessness Is Oddly Absent

April 5, 2011 by NewsMaker Leave a Comment

Mustafa Quraishi/Associated PressWarren E. Buffett said he would refer questions about David L. Sokol back to a written statement.

Warren E. Buffett has a favorite saying: “Lose money for my firm, and I will be understanding. Lose a shred of reputation for the firm, and I will be ruthless.”

But as speculation of insider trading swirls around Mr. Buffett’s onetime heir apparent, David L. Sokol, it has to be asked: Why hasn’t Mr. Buffett been ruthless?

Mr. Buffett is likely to face a barrage of questions this month at Berkshire Hathaway’s annual meeting in Omaha, often described as “Woodstock for Capitalists.” This year, it could be called “The Great Inquisition.” Every year, Mr. Buffett and his partner, Charlie Munger, take questions from shareholders and a panel of journalists — including me — in front of 35,000 people for five hours.

When Mr. Buffett announced Mr. Sokol’s resignation last week in a detailed announcement, he stated, “If questioned about this matter in the future, I will simply refer the questioner back to this release.”

DealBook Column

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But given the scrutiny that Mr. Sokol’s behavior is now under, it will be hard for Mr. Buffett to dodge the inquiries.

Here are some of the questions that deserve answers from Mr. Buffett.

¶In the statement announcing Mr. Sokol’s resignation, you acknowledged that he had made “a passing remark” that he owned shares in Lubrizol in January, two months before Berkshire announced a deal to buy the chemical maker. What, exactly, did he tell you? Do you feel he misled you? If not, why, given your penchant for straight talk, did you not come out later and say, “I should have asked more questions.”

If it was only a passing remark, why did you tell Mr. Munger about Mr. Sokol’s investment? Did you tell the rest of Berkshire’s board about Mr. Sokol’s Lubrizol holdings before it voted on the deal? What prompted you to ask Berkshire’s chief financial officer for Mr. Sokol’s trading records just days after announcing the acquisition of Lubrizol?

¶During Mr. Sokol’s interview on CNBC last week, he said, “I guess knowing today what I know, what I would do differently is that I wouldn’t have mentioned it to Warren and just made the investment and left it alone. I think that’s a disservice to Berkshire. But if that’s what people want to do in the future, that’s fine.”

Do you believe Mr. Sokol — to whom Citigroup floated the Lubrizol deal in his capacity as officer of Berkshire — had a fiduciary duty to run the idea past you? Or was he free to make a personal investment, without discussing a potential acquisition with you? What is Berkshire’s policy on such trading?

Mr. Sokol also compared his investment with one that Mr. Munger, vice chairman of Berkshire and one of your best friends, previously made — that is, buying a 3 percent stake in BYD, the Chinese electric carmaker, before Berkshire took a big share in the company. Was it an apt comparison?

¶You have said that Mr. Sokol did not do anything “unlawful.” But Mr. Sokol bought shares of Lubrizol a day after he told Citigroup to indicate Berkshire’s interest in buying the company.

Why don’t you consider that “material” information, a crucial component of insider trading? Do you not believe that a Lubrizol shareholder would have considered such information important to their investment decision? Clearly Lubrizol felt that Mr. Sokol’s inquiry was material enough to hold a board meeting on Jan. 6, one day before Mr. Sokol bought almost $10 million of shares.

If Mr. Sokol was aware of Lubrizol’s board meeting, would you consider that material information? And if a news outlet had reported Mr. Sokol’s inquiry or Lubrizol’s decision to meet, do you not think that the price of Lubrizol’s shares would have risen?

Here is another way to think about it: If a Citigroup banker had bought shares of Lubrizol at the same time as Mr. Sokol, would you have considered that insider trading? Isn’t that the definition of insider trading? What did Mr. Sokol do that was different?

¶Berkshire has always been a very decentralized institution with only 21 of its 257,000 employees working at headquarters and each subsidiary left to its own devices. “Most of these managers are happiest when they are left alone to run their businesses, and that is customarily just how we leave them,” you recently wrote in the annual letter.

This structure might seem like a bastion of efficiency. But given Mr. Sokol’s possible transgressions, do you now think Berkshire needs more compliance programs and people to manage them?

¶In your statement, you said Mr. Sokol “told me that” the trades in Lubrizol “were not a factor in his decision to resign.” Many Buffett watchers, including myself, noticed that you did not unequivocally say that his resignation was unrelated to the trades — just that Mr. Sokol said it was.

If you believed Mr. Sokol, why didn’t you just say it was unrelated? And if you didn’t believe Mr. Sokol’s explanation, why did you relay his story?

¶You have long followed the mantra of Dale Carnegie: “Praise by name, criticize by category.”

But in recent years, you have been criticized, for example, as being too soft on companies like Moody’s, in which you had invested. You often publicly lambaste certain industries or practices, but rarely specific companies or people.

Given your stature in the business world, do you think you have a broader responsibility to call out wrongdoing?

¶Finally, how has this scandal changed your evaluation of potential successors?

Do you have a question to ask Mr. Buffett or Mr. Munger at Berkshire’s annual meeting later this month? Please send it to me at arsorkin@nytimes.com. (Also, let me know if I can use your name and if you are a shareholder.)

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=c207625ae798fff5e1a26ba76845938d

Filed Under: Business News Tagged With: mr buffett, questioner, resignation