A Strange New Twist in the Chief Exec’s Pay-Off Saga

We broke the story that former chief exec, Abi Gbago was going to leave the council. It had been an open secret that relations between the mayor and her chief exec had been fraught for some time.

We also broke the story that Gbago was being offered a substantial payout of £239,000 if she left with an NDA.

What we did not learn until after the decision was made was that the mayor had submitted a paper claiming that both she and her cabinet had lost confidence in the chief exec.

It seems, and we have to put this delicately, it seems that the mayor rather overstated the position of her cabinet colleagues. They, we understand, had not been asked.

And now they have taken umbrage.

We are told that the cabinet has jointly written to the Standards Board with a complaint against Mayor Fiaz. In short, she appended their names and asserted their support for a statement with which they did not agree.

Clearly, saying that the mayor and the cabinet have lost confidence in the chief exec is stronger than saying simply the mayor. But it seems that it was not true.

Of course, all of this could be political maneuvering in an attempt for cabinet members to distance themselves from the current mayor, but whether its principle or politics, Mayor Fiaz is looking increasingly isolated.