Elena Sánchez, interim president of RTVE, is finding her position in the Public Corporation difficult. Last Thursday she faced her first Extraordinary Council, the first to which the directors summoned her and, as EL MUNDO has learned and this has been confirmed by several of the RTVE unions, it was a more than tense meeting. So much so that Sánchez canceled and postponed one of the votes on the agenda out of fear that she would not be able to move forward and would be left without any support, which would show her weakness in the presidency of the entity.
There were only two points: the selection process for the new HR director after the resignation on February 15 of Pablo Galán in the middle of the call for oppositions to the entity, and the controversial ‘forensic’ report, a report commissioned from an external audit on certain expenses of some executives during the time of José Manuel López Tornero, previous president of the Corporation.
As they explain to EL MUNDO, Elena Sánchez resisted this Extraordinary Council for days, since she was afraid of losing the vote for the selection of Galán’s replacement. The result of this first point was the suspension of the selection process for the new HR director until more information was obtained.
“The person who currently has to direct HR must be someone from the house because we have very complicated processes open such as oppositions, the 35-hour day, union elections at the end of the year and many others,” says Miguel Ángel Curieses. Gaite, general secretary of the UGT in CRTVE. “It has to be someone who knows what there is. It is not the best time for someone from outside to come. The problem is that with the selection process that Elena Sánchez has presented, no one from the house meets the conditions because the conditions are made accordingly. hoc for someone from outside,” he adds. A complaint that is also shared by the Independent Union of Communication and Diffusion (SI) and a good part of the directors who speak of a “tailor-made” selection.
The specifications presented by the president for said selection, among many other points, require that the person who is going to replace Galán have a high level of English, something that the unions consider “unnecessary”, since “the work of a HR director is negotiating and contacting unions and workers”. A second condition is that they have signed at least one agreement, another requirement that is not understood from home, since “there are RTVE HR people who have worked on agreement negotiations, but have not signed it and, therefore, , do not meet the requirement, despite the fact that they would be equally qualified”. And, finally, that he has been in the HR department for at least 5 years, another point that they consider impossible for someone from the house to fulfill.
They assure that in the face of protests from the Board of Directors, Elena Sánchez verified the weakness in which she finds herself and at the same time, they affirm, showed considerable contempt towards the Council of the Public Corporation. Thus, seeing the reaction and tension that was generated in the extraordinary meeting, the interim president decided to paralyze the selection process “because otherwise she would lose.”
Given this, several unions and several councilors present last Thursday denounced that the intention of the general management of RTVE is to appoint an HR director “who has a name and surname” without there being any possibility that the chosen one is from within RTVE .
“We do not understand that with the talent that is in the house, that there are 6,500 workers, a selection is being sought and prepared so that it is someone from outside. This is not only serious, it is that we suspect that a specific person is being thought of It scandalizes us,” says UGT.
What worries several directors and the unions the most is that RTVE continues without a HR director in the midst of preparing the expected oppositions for RTVE positions. They claim and, this is how they have made it known to Elena Sánchez, who they say is “against the ropes” is that the selection process be internal: “I would have to look for an interim HR management because if there is an interim president she would have to choose an interim HR director so that when the situation of this presidency is resolved, whoever arrives can form his trusted team”. A CRTVE HR director has no limitation on the position.
The second point of the Extraordinary Council added even more discontent among the directors. Some say that Elena Sánchez’s explanations about the ‘forensic’ report are a “lie” and ask that if an external audit has been requested to investigate certain expenses of directors from Tornero’s time, that of all directors and not only of the time that Tornero was president of RTVE.
Last December, the General Intervention of the State Administration (IGAE) delivered a report to RTVE in which expenses of more than 11,000 euros were indicated by its former president and some of its managers that had not been justified by the appropriate form.
As a result of this report, the corporation commissioned a ‘forensic’ report to an external company to investigate the invoices presented by said managers and conclude whether or not they were within the law. And here is the problem and what has caused a strong division of the CRTVE Board of Directors. Elena Sánchez is blamed, on the one hand, for commissioning this report behind the Council’s back, and, on the other, for having requested it only to go against Tornero and two of its directors when the issue of expenses affects dozens of managers.
Elena Sánchez assured last Thursday that she did not know that it had been commissioned and who had commissioned it, but sources familiar with said report affirm that it was commissioned from the corporate management of RTVE, commanded by Marta Torralvo.
“The Audit and Compliance Committee – commanded by the counselor Juan José Baños (appointed by the PNV) and which includes Carmen Sastre (appointed by the PP), Concepción Cascajosa (PSOE), Roberto Lakidain (Podemos) and Ramón Colom- expresses its surprise that a process of this type was initiated without the knowledge, and, therefore, authorization, of the interim presidency, without an express report from legal counsel and with a certain opinion of the State Attorney, the foundation of which is not recorded. All this, the Audit and Compliance Committee is going to request the two departments that depend on said body, to proceed to investigate the methodology followed for the process that is the subject of this communication”, said Committee said a few weeks ago, which also considers that the report forensic “sets a precedent on RTVE with risks that are difficult to assess”.
The division in the Board of Directors in the face of the selection process for the HR director and the ‘forensic’ report has placed Elena Sánchez in a difficult position to sustain, according to sources close to her. One part of the council, and this was made visible last Thursday, believes that the managers indicated in the report must return the money for said expenses, while another considers that this report has been requested with a single intention: to target Tornero and certain managers.
On March 30, the Board of Directors meets again in ordinary session and it is expected that these issues will be put on the table again, which have caused more than discomfort in the Board and among the unions. In addition, as EL MUNDO has learned, on the agenda will also be the complaint filed with the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor for personal bribery against the director of Sports, Arsenio Cañada, and the director of Teledeporte, Francisco Javier Javier, for “covert advertising” to the dress all RTVE presenters and collaborators with El Ganso clothing during the coverage of the World Cup in Qatar without CRTVE’s knowledge.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
