His successor will be Kerstin Gelbmann, as Strabag announced on Tuesday followingnoon. The trigger was “personal reasons” in the context of Signa as well as consideration for his health.
In a “personal statement” said Gusenbauer: “The public discussion regarding individual Signa companies in difficulties, of which I am the chairman of the supervisory board, has caused me to resign from the supervisory board mandate and thus also the chairmanship of Strabag SE as of December 31, 2023. I want to avoid any shadow of reputation falling on Strabag Otherwise, Signa does not have any special business relationships with them.”
The SPÖ leader also stated in writing: “In addition, I don’t feel able to withstand the enormous pressure and responsibility that comes with it, in terms of my health.” He would like to thank the shareholders of Strabag, “who have placed their trust in me for over 13 years” and wishes Kerstin Gelbmann “good luck and success.”
Successor with experience
The commitment of Gusenbauer The signing of the Tyrolean investor René Benko was recently more than controversial, especially when the magazine “News” reported that the ex-SPÖ boss had billed consulting fees amounting to a good 7 million euros for the years 2020 to 2022 . For Florian Beckermann, board member of the Association for Investors (IVA), takes Gusenbauer with his step pressure from the Strabag in the context of the Signa – because with Benko’s empire you are only at the beginning of the Enlightenment.
Gusenbauers In any case, her successor, Gelbmann, has supervisory board experience and is part of the group around Strabag founder Hans Peter Haselsteiner – who is also involved in Signa – and the renovator Erhard Grossnigg. The latter has recently become spokesman for the board of the two currently not insolvent Benko real estate companies Signa Prime Selection and Signa Development Selection.
Less than two years as Chancellor
Today it was also announced that the controversial Russian Strabag major shareholder Oleg Deripaska had transferred his 27.8 percent stake in Strabag to a Russian stock corporation called Iliadis JSC. Strabag’s board of directors was informed today that a purchase agreement had been concluded for all shares in MKAO “Rasperia Trading Limited” (Rasperia), which is controlled by Deripaska, the group said. There are still a few questions unanswered for small investor representative Beckermann, but at least it is the first time “that we have seen an active step from Deripaska,” he told the APA.
Gusenbauer He had been Chancellor for less than two years when he resigned in 2008. Pressure from within the party forced the Lower Austrian to hand the issue over to Werner Faymann. Gusenbauer, born in 1960, started a classic party career in the 1980s. From 1984 to 1990, as chairman of the Socialist Youth, he laid the foundation for his later role and created a political foothold for himself. The professional mainstay was the SP-dominated Lower Austrian Chamber of Labor, for which the doctor of political science worked for many years.
