LISBON: The government was expected to nominate a new chairman for ailing state bank Caixa Geral de Depoósitos (CGD) by the end of this week. It was then expected to put the name forward to the “European supervisory mechanisms,” following the resignation of the bank’s chairman over the weekend, Prime Minister António Costa said.
Speaking to journalists in Mangualde, near the city of Viseu, António Costa said the government regretted the decision of the former chairman of CGD, António Domingues to stand down along with six members of his board of directors. “In a democratic regime, we all have to respect the legislation approved by the parliament, even when we don’t agree with it. Now what is essential is for Caixa to have a board as quickly as possible,” Costa said. Domingues took office as the state bank’s chairman only on 31 August of this year, having stepped down from his position on the board of rival bank BPI on 30 June.
Last Wednesday ,the European commission confirmed that it had held meetings with Domingues to talk about plans to inject fresh capital into CGD when he was still a director of BPI, one of Portugal’s largest non-state banks.
Portugal’s government insisted on Thursday that Domingues was given no “access to any confidential information” in meetings with European Union officials earlier this year, when he was still a director of a rival bank. This latest controversy followed another about the fact that the new CGD chairman had not published his full financial details as required by the country’s constitution for senior officials at state institutions.
