If the KNCB Board had hoped that their termination of the contract of CEO Milena van Not would pass without opposition they appeared on Thursday to have miscalculated badly, as outrage grew at the decision.
Club administrators rallied to the defence of Ms. van Not, condemning the Board’s abrupt termination of her contract after only ten months and the way it had been presented as the result of mutual agreement.
HBS chairman Ewout Boendermaker spoke for many when he described the move as ‘a definite step backwards’, while another senior administrator commented that ‘if the clubs don’t stand up against this, [the Board] will be able to get away with anything.’
It is understood that club representatives have arranged a video meeting with the Board next Monday at which their unhappiness with the decision will be fully aired, and there are reportedly moves afoot to demand that the Board call a special general meeting to consider the issue.
Under the KNCB constitution such a meeting can be requisitioned by ten clubs or a quarter of the membership, and the Board is then required to call the meeting within four weeks. Should no action be taken by the Board within a fortnight, the clubs are empowered to convene the meeting themselves.
The constitution also gives a general meeting the power to suspend or dismiss any Board member ‘for stated reasons’; such a decision, however, requires the support of 75% of the votes cast.
The Board has yet to clarify the nature of the policy differences between itself and Ms. van Not which led to the termination of her contract. There has been no response to a request from Emerging Cricket for an explanation of this, or of the contrast between the Board’s presentation of the decision as one by mutual agreement and the strong suggestions that in fact the Board acted unilaterally.
It seems very likely, however, that the source of the dispute is the determination of some Board members to seek to interfere even more directly with the day-to-day operations of the staff, in clear contravention of the Directiestatuut [management regulations], which lay down the respective functions of the Board on the one hand and of the CEO and her staff on the other.
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