SINGAPORE: Mr Philip Yeo, a board member of City Developments Limited (CDL), on Friday (Feb 28) described group CEO Sherman Kwek's statement a day earlier as an "attempt to distract everyone from the matter at hand".

Mr Yeo is among the minority directors led by Mr Kwek's father and executive chairman Kwek Leng Beng.

In a statement, he said Mr Sherman Kwek and the directors acting with him intentionally circumvented the Nomination Committee and pushed through the appointment of two new additional independent directors against legal advice.

"They quickly reconstituted the Nomination Committee and the Remuneration Committee as the Nomination & Remuneration Committee to effectively immobilise the executive chairman," Mr Yeo added.

He said Mr Sherman Kwek should focus on making back S$1.9 billion of shareholders' losses that occurred through a deal involving Sincere Properties as well as the other losses from the UK property investments. 

"Instead, he seems more concerned about grievances, mobilising a group of independent directors to remove an advisor to the CDL hospitality business, which has actually seen profit improvements for the past few years since COVID," Mr Yeo said.

"CDL was acquired by Mr Kwek Hong Png, Mr Kwek Leng Joo and Mr Kwek Leng Beng," he added, referring to Mr Kwek Leng Beng's late father and brother.

"I know all three of them well. The men of our era all dared to dream. That is how the three of them executed so well to build a multi-billion-dollar Singaporean company that competes on a global scale. The CDL CEO must learn from them. Just pure hard work to serve all shareholders!"

The family feud and power struggle spilled into the public domain on Wednesday when the elder Kwek said his son was attempting a boardroom "coup".

Both men have since made several public statements, each laying out their account of the events that led to the fallout.

The younger Kwek on Thursday singled out his father's associate as the source of a dispute within CDL. Dr Catherine Wu, 65, is an adviser to the board of Millennium & Copthorne Hotels (M&C), a subsidiary of CDL.

Mr Sherman Kwek also said that there was no attempt to oust the chairman. 

Mr Yeo disagreed with this.

"The facts are that the CDL CEO and the directors acting with him circumvented the nomination committee intentionally and pushed through the appointment of two new additional independent directors against legal advice," Mr Yeo said in a statement. 

"They quickly reconstituted the nomination committee and the remuneration committee as the nomination and remuneration committee to effectively immobilise the executive chairman."

In a separate statement on Friday, Mr Kwek Leng Beng reiterated that his legal action stemmed from serious concerns about his son’s attempt to undermine the governance structure of CDL.

"The allegations made by Sherman regarding the remarks of the court are misleading," he said.

"In the past weeks, they bypassed the Nomination Committee on two occasions in breach of the relevant regulations under the SGX Listing Rules and the Code of Corporate Governance. This is why we had to make the court application. It was necessary to protect the interests of CDL and its shareholders during this period of significant turmoil."

On his son's statement saying there was no attempt to oust him, Mr Kwek Leng Beng said: "This misses the point. Protecting good governance, including the office of the executive chairman, and not me as an individual, is critical. Stripping away any meaningful authority of the executive chairmann is a coup. It is now a matter before the court and I will let the court decide. Justice always prevails."