WILLEMSTAD - On May 23, Mr. Roderick van Kwartel was fired as director of Refineria di Korsou N.V. (RdK). This dismissal was pronounced at a special meeting of shareholders of the public company.
On October 12, 2018, the supervisory board of RdK (SB) introduced an investigation into possible irregularities that have taken place around the bidding process for operating the refinery. The reason for this was accusations from representatives of one of the participants in the bidding process who allegedly experienced these irregularities.
The investigators' final report - Ivy Corporate Defense & Investigations - dated January 23, 2019, found that there was a parallel process in addition to the bidding process in which irregularities occurred. This report also notes that Mr. van Kwartel was involved in the irregularities. It has also been established for the Supervisory Board that Mr. van Kwartel has provided the Supervisory Board with incomplete and incorrect information in this regard.
The Supervisory Board has guaranteed that both during and after the investigation, Mr. van Kwartel was given sufficient opportunity to be heard or to give his opinion on the (interim) findings. Mr. van Kwartel was given the opportunity to do this several times during the process.
After the Supervisory Board has studied the investigation results and views of Mr. van Kwartel, the Supervisory Board has come to the conclusion that Mr. van Kwartel - by initiating and participating in the parallel process and not informing the Supervisory Board incorrectly and incompletely - has behaved as may be expected from a good manager. In this context, according to the Supervisory Board, it also applies that Mr. van Kwartel should have realized in his position and given the circumstances what the consequences of these actions would be for the bidding process and the public interest. For this reason, the Supervisory Board has lost its confidence in Mr. van Kwartel as its managing director and advised the sole shareholder to dismiss Mr. van Kwartel.
After the sole shareholder submitted the intention to dismiss him for advice to the corporate governance consultant and the consultant concluded on 25 April this year that he had no serious objections to the intended dismissal of Mr. van Kwartel, a special meeting of shareholders was convened for 23 May. During this meeting, Mr. van Kwartel was heard by the General Meeting of Shareholders and the members of the Executive Board and the Supervisory Board were given the opportunity to cast their advisory vote. During its deliberation, the general meeting of shareholders - having regarded all the arguments put forward - has ascertained that no facts and circumstances have been put forward that justify the actions of Mr. van Kwartel. The general meeting of shareholders thus decided during the special meeting to proceed with the dismissal of Mr. van Kwartel with immediate effect.