SINGAPORE: Dr Catherine Wu, the woman said to be at the centre of the City Developments Limited (CDL) boardroom struggle, has resigned as an independent adviser to the board of subsidiary Millennium & Copthorne Hotels Limited (MCHL).
Dr Wu had held the post since August 2024. Before that, Dr Wu had been a director on the MCHL board between June 2022 and January 2024.
In a statement, CDL’s executive chairman Kwek Leng Beng said that the MCHL board on Tuesday (Mar 4) received the “irrevocable resignation of Dr Catherine Wu as an unpaid independent advisor, with immediate effect”.
The elder Kwek’s son, Sherman, who is the group CEO of CDL, had earlier said that Dr Wu has been “interfering in matters going well beyond her scope”, adding that “she wields and exercises enormous influence”.
Mr Kwek Leng Beng said: “The CDL CEO had sought to justify his board coup and overt breaches of corporate governance with unproven insinuations about Dr Wu.
He said that the “primary reason for the dispute relates to a very serious issue of corporate governance within the CDL group arising from the conduct of one Dr Catherine Wu”.
“Now that Dr Wu has resigned, the CEO and his team of directors no longer have any continuing basis to make such corporate governance allegations about CDL and to justify his Board coup,” the elder Kwek added.
“It is high time that we restore investor confidence and ensure those breaches of corporate governance committed by the CEO and his team of directors (including breaches of the SGX Listing Rules and the Code of Corporate Governance) will never happen again.”
He went on to point out several issues that CDL needs to address, citing several examples under the CEO’s leadership.
One such instance was the Sincere Property “debacle” that ended up in an extraordinary loss of S$1.9 billion for CDL in FY2020, he said.
He attributed substantial financial setbacks in the UK property market to “poorly judged investment decisions” that led to a 94 per cent decline in profits during the first half of 2023.
He also said CDL’s share price has “persistently lagged” behind its peers since his son took the helm in 2018, and that it dropped even further due to the recent breaches of the relevant regulations by the CEO and his team of directors.
“The first step in addressing these challenges should be to strengthen the corporate governance framework in a way that aligns with shareholders’ long-term interests,” he said.
“Our utmost focus on CDL’s core businesses is critical and essential for regaining a stable path of profitability. I am convinced that such an approach will surely restore investor confidence and enhance shareholder value over time.”
CDL is one of Singapore’s largest property companies, controlled by the Kwek family.
The family feud and boardroom tussle was thrust into the public spotlight when Kwek Leng Beng issued a statement, saying he was taking his son to court over alleged governance lapses and an attempted power grab at the board level.
The 84-year-old characterised his son’s actions as an attempted “coup” and said he was seeking to restore corporate integrity.
In a subsequent statement, the elder Kwek announced that his son and other directors acting with him have agreed to cease further action following a court hearing.
Mr Sherman Kwek had said that his father’s first statement failed to present a “full picture” of the dispute.
He said that the claim that there was an “attempted coup” by the majority directors to consolidate control of CDL’s board was not only incorrect, but it also distracted from the nub of the issue, therefore requiring them to respond to present the full picture.