The state bailout of Lufthansa has been sealed and the airline’s new path has been set. However, board member Dirks does not want to go along with this. According to a report, the reason is that there are no bonuses.
Former telecommunications manager Thorsten Dirks will leave the Lufthansa Executive Board after three years. Dirks took “the successful completion of the state stabilization measure as an opportunity to withdraw from the company’s board of directors,” said Lufthansa. No further details of the reasons were given. The “Handelsblatt” reported, however, that Dirks should not have been willing to waive bonus payments.
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Dirks was appointed to the board in May 2017. Afterwards he led the daughter Eurowings “through a difficult phase”, said Lufthansa. At the end of 2019, Dirks gave up responsibility for Eurowings and took over the newly founded IT, Digital & Innovation department. After the former CFO Ulrik Svensson left in April, significant parts of the finance department were added and Dirk’s area was renamed “Digital and Finance”. The executive board chairman, Carsten Spohr, will take over this executive board position until further notice.
On Thursday, Lufthansa’s shareholders approved an overwhelming 98.04 percent majority in a government bailout package consisting of a stake, a federal silent participation and a loan. The ailing airline thus receives nine billion euros in aid from the federal government – this is conditional on the board of directors foregoing bonuses and royalties until the state has given up 75 percent of its stake in Lufthansa. At the former Dax group, the variable remuneration on the executive board, according to “Handelsblatt”, accounts for a large part of the remuneration, sometimes up to 50 percent.
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