SFA could rue the day they opened the door to King
IN conversation, an influential chairman in the Scottish game recently offered a private opinion he wouldn’t necessarily shout from the rooftops.
The SFA, he claimed, will live to regret the day they declared Dave King a fit and proper person.
The chairman of Rangers currently faces a Court of Session hearing over a breach of City rules. He could even be given the cold shoulder by Britain’s financial services industry.
In time, our man’s prediction could look like a prophecy.
Issues surrounding King are not new. In May 2015, some members of the 11-man Professional Game Board (PGB) had concerns over the Glasgow-born businessman’s 41 convictions under the South African Income Tax Act.
Decisions over who were ‘fit and proper’ persons were firmly in their domain. They had already waved through Rangers director Paul Murray.
PGB members were surprised, then, when a decision on King was reassigned to the full board of the SFA without explanation and waved through on a show of hands. It’s not difficult to guess why. When the alternative is angry supporters on the steps of Hampden, it’s easier, sometimes, to adopt the path of least resistance. To go for a quiet life.
But the events of this week might soon call that thinking into question.
Rangers already have some legal battles on their plate. And King has now picked a fight with the Takeover Appeal Board (TAB).
One which could see the Court of Session take action. And pose new questions of the SFA’s ‘fit and proper’ decision of two years ago.
In the aftermath of a £43million payment to settle his bitter, lengthy dispute with the South African tax authorities in 2013, King vowed to learn from his mistakes.
‘When this tax dispute arose many years ago, I took a conscious decision not to co-operate with the authorities,’ said the son of a Glasgow policeman.
‘That was a mistake. I accept the fact that I have been non-compliant in the past and will rectify this.’
Last month, however, TAB decided he had breached takeover rules by acting in concert with fellow shareholders Douglas Park, George Letham and George Taylor to acquire a 34-per-cent stake in Rangers in 2015.
Get past 30 per cent of share ownership and you are required, by law, to make an offer to buy all the other shares.
The TAB put the onus on King to put up £11m as proof of funds and make an offer of 20p a share.
After he branded the ruling a nonsense, it was no surprise when he failed to comply.
Fellow shareholders were never likely to sell at less than the market value. And, even if no one sold him a single share, the cost of setting up the offer would reach six figures. In real terms, the whole exercise would be an expensive act of financial window-dressing.
Yet, playing by his own rules could now have consequences for King.
Fans of rival clubs — one in particular — can barely disguise their glee at this.
Grateful King was willing to step in when others wouldn’t, Rangers supporters groups remain doggedly loyal to their chairman. Many will see the TAB action as a witch-hunt. Others are beginning to see they can’t afford to grant Dave King a free pass forever.
How his fellow Ibrox directors and co-investors will react to the situation is the bigger intrigue.
George Letham cautioned King of the dangers of being found to act as a concert party. He warned of the risks. Recent events now make it tricky for the Three Bears to convert millions of pounds of loans to equity and get their money back. They have to be concerned.
Cold shouldering has only been applied three times. Financial institutions are part of a member’s club and King would effectively be ejected.
It’s possible all this is happening because King can’t comply with TAB. That he doesn’t have £11m at his disposal. But this is a man who promised to ‘over-invest’ in the Ibrox club. He has happily given the impression he’s not short of a bob or two.
On that basis, the SFA decided he was worth a punt when Rangers were in distress two years ago.
The governing body’s best hope of avoiding potential embarrassment now is if RIFC plc directors come to a conclusion King has outlived his usefulness. That he should step down. If they don’t? The men charged with policing Scottish football may come to rue the day they gambled on a leopard changing his spots.
“They gambled on a leopard changing spots”