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Thread: 5A1 Noritsyn, Itkin et al campaign to remove the CFC president

  1. #71
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vladimir Drkulec View Post
    So why do you think that I should be removed?
    ADDITIONAL REASONS FOR REMOVING CFC PRESIDENT FROM OFFICE

    Let’s look at two recent episodes of the CFC President’s alarming behaviour.

    FIRST EPISODE
    At the CFC Board of Directors, a vote was taken on the intention to ask CFC Publicity Officer Vadim Tsypin to resign due to his unworthy behaviour and attempt to bribe. While the majority of Directors voted for an action, President Vladimir Drkulec declined to move forward. By doing so, the CFC President broke the new CFC bylaw which reads: “At all meetings of the board, every question shall be decided by a majority of the votes cast on the question.”

    The President justified his inaction as follows:

    Quote Originally Posted by Vladimir Drkulec
    The decision was that I do something which I and the board could be sued for … You cannot help your friend Hal Bond if it puts the CFC at risk of a catastrophic loss.
    In my opinion Hal Bond’s commentary on this situation is well put (taken from this Forum: http://www.chesscanada.info/forum/sh...ampaign-Thread post #76):

    Quote Originally Posted by Hal Bond
    If we can’t even object to a bribe without being sued by the person who offered it, we should close our doors. We are not an organization, we are a hostage.
    If any of the Voting Members are interested in finer details regarding this episode, they can be read in another thread on this Forum (English Chat – A Vote of No Confidence for the CFC President; https://www.chesscanada.info/forum/s...-CFC-President). The position of the CFC President is detailed in posts ## 22, 24, 33, 34, 35, 36, and 43, and my position is in posts ## 23, 32, 37, 38, and 42 in that thread.

    SECOND EPISODE
    In December 2020, Diana Tsypina (Tsypin’s spouse) submits her application to Hal Bond to be promoted to IA Category B at her 1-year anniversary since she was granted IA Category D title. It takes at least five years to be promoted to IA Category B. Tsypina makes her move 4 years early, ahead of others who wait their turn. After been rejected by Hal Bond, Diana Tsypina escalated her issue to the CFC President Vladimir Drkulec, who decided to endorse her application. The CFC President justified his decision as follows:

    Quote Originally Posted by Vladimir Drkulec
    There was a way for the case to go forward without the CFC's approval by applying directly to FIDE. A successful application after we refused would make us look very bad. We would appear to be working to block the advance of a francophone woman. Not a good look for us … Make no mistake, this would have ended up in a court of law …
    The year prior Vadim Tsypin made a similar move applying to become a Category B IA one year after receiving his Category D title. Vadim Tsypin at the time convinced the CFC President Vladimir Drkulec to petition FIDE for an exemption to time served. Hal Bond, as soon as he found out what happened, brought the issue to the CFC Board of Directors, and at its unanimous direction Vladimir Drkulec was forced to write to FIDE a letter of retraction. In his email to CFC Directors dated February 13, 2020, Vladimir Drkulec confirmed that Tsypin misled him (and FIDE) regarding FIDE Arbiter classification regulations:
    “That I wrote the retraction is only proof that I believe I acted incorrectly” (re: petitioning FIDE).

    How then, one year later, can Vlad commit the same error for which he publicly apologized when a similar situation arose regarding Diana Tsypina?


    This last episode immediately led to Hal Bond’s resignation. To the displeasure of most of the CFC Directors, Vladimir Drkulec rejected the initiative to appoint Aris Marghetis as a new FIDE Representative by the Board’s decision, and instead convened a Special Meeting for this purpose. Surprisingly, at this Special Meeting Vladimir Drkulec publically endorsed Vadim Tsypin – the person who misled him in the past and who the majority of board of directors voted to resign as CFC Publicity Officer – for the Director position of CFC FIDE Representative:

    Quote Originally Posted by Vladimir Drkulec
    I believe that Victor Plotkin is a good candidate but Vadim Tsypin is a great candidate. … If there is any doubt, I am supporting Vadim in this election.
    So, instead of offering Vadim Tsypin to resign from CFC Publicity Officer’s position (because he feared to be sued by Vadim), Vladimir Drkulec promotes him to become a CFC Director and the CFC FIDE Representative! Why on earth he acted in such a way we can only guess. Perhaps, for a better assessment of the situation, it is worth paying attention to the opinion of Hal Bond, which he expressed at this forum (http://www.chesscanada.info/forum/sh...ampaign-Thread post #76):

    Quote Originally Posted by Hal Bond
    Make no mistake about it, this is not only about what has (not) happened, this is also about our future. Vlad is not corrupt at all, but to me he appears to behave like he has been compromised by the offender. This is not good for the CFC. We need to ensure the independence of the CFC Executive.
    CONCLUSION
    Vladimir Drkulec has acted out of accordance with the majority vote of Directors and he has knowingly repeated his previous error with seemingly no regard for the rules. His only justification is a vague fear of being sued, which is clearly just an excuse – he only received friendly legal advice, but did not consult an independent lawyer. This is no way for a President to behave. If you disagree with the choice of the Director’s majority vote and do not want to execute it then you resign, just like Hal Bond did after Tsypina’s application was approved by the CFC. When you also add in Vlad’s further disregard for the rules and due process in the February Special Meeting (which has been pointed out in this thread above), there is no doubt in my mind that Vladimir Drkulec is not acting in the best interests of Canadian chess and should be voted out of office.

    P.S.
    I deliberately do not use the episode with the forged Hal Bond email in my reasoning, because there is insufficient evidence of exactly how the original email was leaked from the internal correspondence of the CFC Board of Directors.
    Last edited by Victor Itkin; 04-14-2021 at 11:21 AM.

  2. #72
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    Quote Originally Posted by Victor Itkin View Post
    None of the five CFC Directors answered these simple questions in 24 hours.

    Isn’t disturbing? Am I the only voting member to be bothered by this?
    Victor. Can you put into plain English what a written requisition is ? Vlad informed the rest of the Executive he would be calling a Special Meeting, as the 5% threshold had been met.

  3. #73
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    Quote Originally Posted by Patricia Gamliel View Post
    The only violation I witnessed during the said voting process was ...
    Patricia,

    I would like to clarify our group's position about your election: we admit that you won this election fairly. And we hope that at this position you will be helpful for the CFC. We have never said that you did anything wrong in regards to the elections.

    The issue is not with you, as a person, but with the order how the February Special Meeting was called by the President, and how the motion for voting for the Director at Large position appeared in the meetings' agenda, and how the order to vote was set. We would have exactly the same issue with Vlad, if instead of you for this position would be nominated any other person (women or men).

    My view is that Victor Plotkin in his post in this thread was trying to say approximately the same.

  4. #74
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    In this particular instance, while a 5% threshold had been met to a call a meeting, the CFC Executive determined that the call for the removal of the President was illegal as it was lacking in 2 areas. It was the choice of the Executive not to help the members, by discussing the deficiencies with them. While I don't support the removal of the President, at the time of our meeting I was disappointed with how we handled this, as it simply seemed to be throwing up roadblocks/technicalities to fully resolving this and begin a healing process.

    With the intricacies of the NFP Act I doubt you are going to be able to put forward a "legal" motion without legal help, then time will be required to prepare a defence, and then to call a special meeting. By the time this is said and done, I think you are all best served with channeling your collective energies to the elections at the AGM.

  5. #75
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fred McKim View Post
    Victor. Can you put into plain English what a written requisition is ? Vlad informed the rest of the Executive he would be calling a Special Meeting, as the 5% threshold had been met.
    Fred,

    English is not my first language. It is difficulty for me to put it more plain than it is written in the law. "Requisition" is expression taken by me from the Section 167 of the NFP Act:

    "Requisition of meeting

    167 (1) The members of a corporation who hold the prescribed percentage of votes that may be cast at a meeting of members sought to be held, or a lower percentage that is set out in the by-laws, may requisition the directors to call the meeting for the purposes stated in the requisition.

    Form

    (2) The requisition referred to in subsection (1), which may consist of several documents of similar form each signed by one or more members, shall state the business to be transacted at the meeting and shall be sent to each director and to the registered office of the corporation."

  6. #76
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    The board has always worked by consensus through emails (that is until we became more efficient and started Zoom meetings at the request of Patricia). Agendas for voting member meetings are proposed by the President and board members can add items to be discussed.

    In late January adding Patricia Gamliel was discussed. She was even discussed much before that meeting when she joined FIDE Social Commission and became quickly known for her skills. Electing her through the members meeting was more democratic and we proceeded this way.

    Appointing more women to the board is required to meet Canadian Olympic Committee and FIDE guidelines.

  7. #77
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    Quote Originally Posted by Victor Itkin View Post
    Fred,

    English is not my first language. It is difficulty for me to put it more plain than it is written in the law. "Requisition" is expression taken by me from the Section 167 of the NFP Act:

    "Requisition of meeting

    167 (1) The members of a corporation who hold the prescribed percentage of votes that may be cast at a meeting of members sought to be held, or a lower percentage that is set out in the by-laws, may requisition the directors to call the meeting for the purposes stated in the requisition.

    Form

    (2) The requisition referred to in subsection (1), which may consist of several documents of similar form each signed by one or more members, shall state the business to be transacted at the meeting and shall be sent to each director and to the registered office of the corporation."
    It is my opinion that the first time I saw the full agenda was on this Forum, although it may have been in the Executive/Directors Forum (I'm not sure, now) - which would seem to satisfy point 2. Obviously any of us had time to suggest modifications.

  8. #78
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fred McKim View Post
    In this particular instance, while a 5% threshold had been met to a call a meeting, the CFC Executive determined that the call for the removal of the President was illegal as it was lacking in 2 areas. It was the choice of the Executive not to help the members, by discussing the deficiencies with them. While I don't support the removal of the President, at the time of our meeting I was disappointed with how we handled this, as it simply seemed to be throwing up roadblocks/technicalities to fully resolving this and begin a healing process.

    With the intricacies of the NFP Act I doubt you are going to be able to put forward a "legal" motion without legal help, then time will be required to prepare a defence, and then to call a special meeting. By the time this is said and done, I think you are all best served with channeling your collective energies to the elections at the AGM.
    Nikolay has presented his requisitions in a Form prescribed by the NFP Act. Let's assume that it was lacking in 2 areas, as you say. But Vlad presented nothing. He did not present any form, which is required by law to be signed and sent to each Director and to the CFC office. Why the Board of Directors did not determine that the call for February Meeting is illegal at that time? Do you have different standards for different members?

    Anyway, we confirm that our position is as follows. We'll look at the results of voting on Vlad's Motion 1 which I and Christina Tao have seconded. If the majority will vote in Vlad's favour, we'll not take any further actions and will wait until the AGM.

    However, if the majority will vote for holding the Special Meeting to vote for removal Vlad from office, then we'll take a lawyer and will fix those lacking 2 areas which you have mentioned.

  9. #79
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vladimir Drkulec View Post
    I very much appreciate the help and contributions of the FQE in organizing events and contributing to the CFC's financial health as you have with the recent payment under the CFC-FQE agreement. There is a much more comprehensive arrangement which the FQE has proposed in the letter which is the subject of one of the threads in this meeting. The FQE is strong in part because of the support they receive from the Quebec government but also because of their ambitious programs some of which the CFC needs to incorporate into its own thinking.

    There are some who have an uninformed hawkish demeanour on things FQE but they are not considering the larger picture. We almost did not get Canadian Olympic Committee recognition (from which flowed all the benefits of Sport Tourism Canada) because the COC was concerned about our relationship to the FQE and the reason that Quebec got only 3 voting members. My response was that this was all that they wanted. The FQE are an excellent resource for the CFC as a source of ideas and organizer energy. What we need from the FQE is their help to become a more bilingual organization. There are many measures in the letter which suggest a path forward in this regard. The problem with the issues raised by this thread is that some people for whatever reason are just intent on starting fires which we then have to waste time and energy in order to put out while having our attention diverted from the many opportunities that we have uncovered in just the last few days.
    The present state of things with the FQE is a sorry state - but one that was created almost entirely by the FQE itself. Given the FQE's decision I do feel that primarily due to its proximity to Ontario that provincial affiliates who have stuck by the CFC through thick and thin have been almost entirely ignored by the CFC. (As a longtime executive member of the BC Chess Federation I can safely say there are those on the board who don't feel the CFC is properly representing provincial interests though with the pandemic much is deferred) Your point that the FQE wanted 3 VM positions and got them is valid - if the COC were to insist on more (for instance the full per capita quota) as a price of doing business with COC I would say "Quebec gets their full quota when they re-affiliate not before and that most organizations do not give ANY representation on their board of governors to unaffiliated organizations" and if push came to shove I would resign before voting any such thing.

    I'd say the COC needs to review the history since their dis-affiliation - to paint the CFC as disinterested and mistreating the FQE is both ignorant and insulting.

    In any case Noritsyn's issue comes down to "did the president fail in his duty either first in calling the February special meeting in the first place, second in adding additional items to the agenda totally unrelated to the FIDE position and third in his handling of the chair challenge" and if so are failures in this area cause for removal from office.

    In my opinion none of the discussion of the FQE and other issues is relevant to the issue here - it's a question of whether governance became mis-governance and if so what should be the result. Nothing more, nothing less.

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    Can someone explain the motion to me ?

    If I understand this correctly we are being asked whether a Special Meeting should be called if the Noritsyn call for a meeting can be legally presented ? Am I missing something here, because if they are able to legally call a meeting why would we vote NO to having it ? Voting Yes only implies that they have met the legal requirement, not how you would vote at the meeting - or am I way off here ??

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