Yesterday Great Canadian Gaming Corporation announced that their President, Director and Chief Executive Officer – Rod Baker will resign from the position effective immediately. Rod Baker handed in his resignation and was later accepted by the company’s board of directors, after Baker and his wife – Ekaterina Baker, were accused of vaccine queue-jumping controversy in Yukon.
Rod Baker and his wife Ekaterina traveled from Vancouver all the way to the small town of Beaver Creek in the Yukon province, in an attempt to receive vaccines earlier by jumping queues. According to the town’s authorities, the couple failed to comply with Yukon’s Civil Emergency Measure Act of not isolating for 14 days when they arrived on Yukon territory, each of them was issued a CA$575 fine.
Irresponsible Behavior
In order to receive the vaccine early, Rod and Ekaterina presented themselves as newly recruited employees of a local motel. This caused an outrage among locals since those vaccines were distributed to the people of Beaver Creek, the couple further endangered the local population by not complying with 14-days self-isolation measures regulated by the provincial government. Their deceptive actions were described as selfish and put high-risk individuals at risk, according to local media.
According to Great Canadian Company’s information, in 2019 alone Baker pocketed over CA$10.6 million, and he is set to receive another CA$28 million due to the sale of Great Canadian Gaming Corporation to Raptor Acquisition Corp. This is not the first time when Baker has been involved in a controversy, since he was in charge of River Rock Casino and Resort amidst reports of money-laundering activities in the premises of the facility.
The Great Canadian Gaming Board of Directors has always been known for being ruthless and doing the right to keep the company’s values intact. The corporation did not link his resignation with the vaccine queue-jumping controversy, since according to the company’s spokesperson, Chuck Keeling clarified that Great Canadian Gaming does not comment on former employee’s personal matters.
Vice-president of the company Terrence Doyle will now take Baker’s place, as an interim president and CEO. Great Canadian’s Chairman, Peter Meredith, believes that Mr. Doyle is more than capable for such responsibility after working with the company for over 20 years. Starting January 24, 2021, Doyle will serve as an interim CEO until a permanent replacement is found.
Negotiations
After months of heated negotiations, the Ontario based gaming operator has been given the green light for its acquisition by the Supreme Court of British Columbia. At initial discussions, the US-based Apollo Global Management was supposed to purchase each Great Canadian Gaming shares for CA$39, but Canadian shareholders expressed their unease and managed to up the price to CA$45 per share.
Back in November 2020, Burgundy Asset Management which is one of the biggest stakeholders in Great Canadian Gaming expressed their frustration over the initial discussed conditions for the acquisition of the company, which at that time estimated to around CA$2.1 billion. Bloombergsen Investment Partners which own 14 percent of the company also opposed the acquisition, by stating that such a deal will not be lucrative for the company
Source:
“Great Canadian Gaming Announces the Resignation of Rod Baker as Director, President & Chief Executive Officer”, Cision, January 25, 2021
