The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Rangers’ call for suspension is dismissed
The Scottish Professional Football League has rejected Rangers’ call for chairman Murdoch MacLennan to be suspended and an independent probe set up into his business links with “leading shareholders” of Celtic.
Ibrox chairman Dave King made the call following reports over MacLennan’s recent appointment as nonexecutive chairman of Independent News & Media Group (INM).
Celtic’s largest shareholder Dermont Desmond is listed as a major shareholder in INM along with Denis O’Brien, who has a minor stake in Rangers’ Glasgow rivals.
The SPFL has insisted MacLennan informed its board of his new role before taking up the offer and denied claims there was a conflict of interest.
MacLennan joined the board of INM, which publishes titles including the Irish Independent and Belfast Telegraph, on March 1.
In a statement on the Rangers website, King said: “The club notes with concern the latest disclosure through the media regarding a business relationship which the chairman of the SPFL has with leading shareholders of a fellow SPFL club. This has given rise to allegations of nondisclosure and it is now imperative that we discover exactly the nature of the information supplied to the SPFL regarding this relationship.
“It is equally important that any conflicts of interest, or even the perception of such, whereby positions within the Scottish football authorities could be undermined, or abused, must be aggressively rooted out of our game.
“The SPFL, therefore, must immediately suspend its chairman pending an independent investigation by a senior QC into the allegations and into the extent that other parties within the SPFL may have co-operated in this alleged non-disclosure.”
In response, a spokesman for the SPFL said: “It’s not surprising that Murdoch, having stepped down as deputy chairman of Telegraph Media Group, should be approached by other businesses in that sector.
“The members of the SPFL board were each informed of Murdoch’s appointment on January 19 2018, the same day it was publicly announced in a press release from Independent News & Media PLC. That release was also circulated to the entire SPFL board that day.
“The appointment was widely reported in the national media at the time, including in The Sunday Times, Belfast Telegraph and Sunday Independent. No director raised this issue subsequently and it was not the subject of any board discussions.
“To be definitive, a nonexecutive position on a PLC does not constitute a business relationship between that individual and a minority shareholder in the company and therefore no investigation is warranted.”