- Is bad behaviour more prevalent than a few years ago?
- Or has mood changed so much that colleagues no longer tolerate bad manners?
- We have seen so many recent scandals emerge from whistle-blowing colleagues
The dramatic sacking of Sebastien de Montessus, boss of Endeavour Mining, has all the makings of a top-notch thriller, complete with dodgy African mining deals, uranium corruption scandals and money laundering.
Born into French aristocracy, De Montessus lived in Niger and Cape Town for some of his life, studied at France’s top schools and then commerce at one of the grand ecoles, going on to work as an M&A banker at Morgan Stanley.
After setting up Only For Your Eyes, a mobile internet access company which went bankrupt, he ended up at French nuclear giant Areva.
He was appointed head of mining and then led the uranium mining and enrichment activities until what was known as the Uranium Gate scandal blew up.
In 2018 De Montessus was charged with corruption as part of court proceedings brought against Areva by Niger, one of the world’s biggest uranium producers.
The dramatic sacking of Sebastien de Montessus, boss of Endeavour Mining, has all the makings of a top-notch thriller
The legal action was levied against the French giant over a Namibian deal in which it bought a stock of uranium from the African country at a discounted price.
This also prompted the French to investigate business dealings at Areva which looked at money laundering, conspiracy to defraud and forgery, leading to the departure of De Montessus and others.
He went on to head up gold miner Endeavour, becoming one of the FTSE 100’s most handsomely paid chiefs. In 2021 he earned as much as £18.8million as a reward for the company successfully shifting its main listing from Canada to London.
The charges against De Montessus, which he denies, cite that an ‘irregular payment instruction’ of $5.9million was issued by him in relation to one of Endeavour’s asset sales.
Endeavour’s board also claims a whistleblower has made allegations about his personal misconduct towards colleagues.
He refutes both claims but acknowledges a ‘lapse in judgement’ over the sale to an unnamed creditor of an asset to offset an amount owed to the company for essential security equipment. Allegedly, this was to protect its partners and employees in an unspecified conflict zone.
It would be rash to make hasty judgments against De Montessus.
What we do know is that mining and commodities trading are among the world’s toughest and most ruthless of markets to operate in, if not the roughest. This usually means that anyone who chooses to trade in these industries tends to be of the roguish daredevil type with the hide of a rhino as well as being razor-sharp.
What is almost more intriguing about this tale is the serious personal misconduct allegation, about which we have no more details. But we can let our imagination run a little as Alpha-male roguish types tend to behave roguishly.
BP chief executive Bernard Looney was forced to quit last year
Charges of personal misconduct are becoming far too common at senior corporate levels. Remember the CBI.
Whether bad behaviour is more prevalent than a few years ago, or the mood has changed so much that colleagues no longer tolerate bad manners, is a moot point. It is probably the latter as we have seen so many recent scandals emerge from whistle-blowing colleagues.
Others who have been exposed for the personal internal relationships include the former BP chief executive Bernard Looney, who was forced to quit last year after misleading his board about past relationships with colleagues.
The whistle was also blown on the NBC Universal boss Jeff Shell, who lost out on millions in share awards, and Steve Easterbrook, the British ex-chief of McDonald’s. The burger boss had to hand back £84million in severance pay after he was fired over his relationships with employees.
Behaving badly comes at a price. The heat is on, and that’s no bad thing.
House buying
What planet is Howard Davies on? The NatWest chairman ruined breakfast for millions yesterday after telling Radio 4 that it is not ‘that difficult to buy a house’.
All you have to do, he said, is save. Really. That’s fine and dandy coming from multimillionaire Davies but house prices are at least 10 times the average salary in the South East where most youngsters want to live.
Rather than dismissing the problem in his usual patronising manner, Davies should be adding his voice to the cry to build more houses. It is not rocket science.
