As chairman, Kobayashi will represent the group of outside directors. Since the organizational change, the company has had three chairmen, including experienced corporate managers and a reputed corporate turnaround artist.
The post of chairman has been vacant since June last year. TEPCO urgently needs to improve its earnings performance to finance compensation payments related to the nuclear disaster and the huge costs of decommissioning the reactors at the plant.
To secure its ability to supply power, however, the electric utility first needs to revamp its corporate culture, which lies at the heart of the company's inability to commit wholeheartedly to the safety-first principle. TEPCO already this year has been hit by a series of embarrassing revelations about security lapses.
The company, for instance, failed to notice malfunctioning of equipment designed to detect unauthorized entry to controlled-access areas at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant in Niigata Prefecture and left the situation uncorrected at multiple sites for more than 30 days since March last year.
These revelations cast fresh doubt about its corporate culture. Kobayashi was involved in development of plans to rebuild TEPCO as a member of the steering committee of the Nuclear Damage Compensation and Decommissioning Facilitation Corporation, a government body set up to help the utility with victim compensation and funding of reactor decommissioning.
Kobayashi also served as an outside director for the utility from to He must be well versed in the problems that beset the company. But his remarks at a news conference to announce his appointment as new chairman were not particularly reassuring. While acknowledging that his principal mission is to restore public trust in the company, Kobayashi said he will develop and execute specific plans to achieve the goal in consultation with the management team. But such a weak-kneed approach will never do the trick.
Kobayashi needs to take to heart the grim reality that TEPCO could face a crisis of survival unless he leads a reform drive to change the corporate mindset to embrace common sense, which society expects, and communicate progress in the effort to the public. He will face the first major test of his ability to lead the company as he deals with plans to release treated radioactive water from the stricken Fukushima plant into the sea.
TEPCO cannot claim to have been dealing with the plight of victims of the nuclear accident in a sincere manner. Tweets by TwitterDev. More from Japan. Japan's new economic stimulus package to exceed 40 tril. Subscribe to get daily news To have the latest news and stories delivered to your inbox, subscribe here. Thank you. Please check your inbox for a confirmation email. Follow us. If you wish to change your message, press 'Cancel' to go back and edit.
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