António Mexia decides to leave EDP. Shareholders will schedule a general meeting

  • ECO News
  • 30 November 2020

Suspended since July by the order of Judge Carlos Alexandre, António Mexia has decided to anticipate the appeal of that decision and communicate that he is unavailable for a new next term of office.

António Mexia told EDP on Monday that he was unwilling to join the company’s new governing bodies for the next term of office, which would be the company’s sixth. He did so with a letter addressed to Luís Amado (chairman of the supervisory board) and Luís Palha da Silva (chairman of the general meeting), to which ECO had access. “There are difficult decisions in life and this is certainly the most difficult in my professional life, above all because it results from a context of incomprehensible injustice.”

In this letter, “which may seem long but will always be short before everything I would have to say and share,” says Mexia, the manager explains why he decided to anticipate this decision. “I do so regardless of the decision that may be handed down by the Lisbon Court of Appeal regarding the appeal that was filed regarding the coercive measures applied almost six months ago”. It was on July 6 that judge Carlos Alexandre validated the suspension of duties of António Mexia, CEO of EDP, and João Manso Neto, CEO of EDP Renováveis, in the case of the electric company rents, which had been proposed by the Public Prosecutor. Among the coercive measures was also the prohibition of contact, by any means, with defendants

“If, as is expected, the Lisbon Court of Appeal reverses the suspension of duties, I intend, as I have already demonstrated, to contribute to this transition, which allows EDP to develop, without any problems, all the enormous potential identified and in full execution, following on from the work done so far and which is widely recognized by the market,” writes Mexia.

As is clear from EDP’s statement to the CMVM, the company’s shareholders asked the interim chairman, Miguel Stilwell, “to present them with a proposal regarding the composition of the Executive Board of Directors for the next term (2021-2023)”. And the manager should therefore become the new CEO of the Portuguese company.

The manager assures in this letter that he will continue to defend the innocence of EDP and himself in the case under investigation, which has become known as the excessive rent process. And what will he do now? “As for the future, I can only be associated with professional challenges in new areas that bring what we have been able to do: important contributions to a more sustainable world from an environmental, economic, social and cultural point of view. One thing I am sure of: they will never conflict with EDP’s interests and projects,” he guarantees.

Stilwell with an open path

Before Mexia’s letter to EDP’s corporate bodies was known, the electric company itself communicated to the market regulator what had been decided. “EDP received today a letter from Mr. António Mexia, suspended Chief Executive Officer (CEO), and a letter from Mr. João Manso Neto, suspended Member of the Executive Board of Directors (EBD), informing the Company of their unavailability to join any candidate list to the corporate bodies of EDP for the upcoming term-of- office (2021-2023).” In practice, the two managers decided to clarify their position before the end of their term of office and pave the way for a faster general meeting and the election of Miguel Stilwell as the new executive chairman.

In fact, as EDP mentions in this statement, the shareholders reveal that they have asked Stilwell to present a proposal for the company’s executive board of directors for the next term of office. And more. “The Undersigned Shareholders expect to be in a position to request the Chairman of the Board of the General Shareholders’ Meeting to convene a meeting to be held in January 2021” for the 2021-2023 term of office.