PZU management board loses Eureko representative
Dutch-based insurer Eureko took its representative off the management board
of insurer PZU yesterday following a dispute with state-appointed managers.
Eureko, which with BIG Bank Gdanski owns 30% of the Polish market leader,
withdrew deputy chief executive Antonio Martins da Costa and accused PZU
management of aborting a strategic investment program. The row followed a
government go-slow on PZU's further privatization and will do nothing to
improve Poland's reputation for dodgy corporate governance less than two
years before it expects to join the European Union. "Basically, da Costa
told us 'I've had enough. I want to leave PZU. I've lost confidence
in...most of the management board'," Eureko CEO Ernst Jansen told reporters.
Jansen said da Costa was a "seasoned insurance professional" who provided
know-how to PZU, outlasting six state-appointed chief executives during his
three-year stint at the firm. While at PZU, da Costa faced accusations of
falsifying documents and had his office bugged during a fraud probe against
the former head of PZU's life arm, Grzegorz Wieczerzak. Wieczerzak was
recently charged with multi-million dollar fraud after spending over a year
in investigative custody. (Reuters) A.K.
