Staff writer, with CNA
Former P.League+ CEO Charles “Blackie” Chen on Tuesday rejoined the league as its vice president, one day after the league announced it was restructuring itself from a company into an association.
The league announced Chen’s unexpected return only after issuing a statement on Monday that it would be “optimized” into an association and inviting former national player Richard Chang to be its chairman.
Chang, 58, is senior vice president in Asia at Costco Wholesale Inc. His success in business management is what led the league to invite him to take the helm, the league said in the statement.
Photo courtesy of P.LEAGUE+
“As a former basketball player and as a business executive of 30-plus years, I hope to bring my background and experience to enhance and differentiate the P.League+ from other Taiwan sports platforms,” Chang said.
Many had interpreted Chang’s appointment to the league as the end of the Chen era, after the latter resigned as chairman of the board, CEO and president after being accused of sexual harassment by several female celebrities in June.
On Oct. 5, Thomas Lee, president of the Pauian Archiland Group, which owns the P.League+’s Taoyuan Pilots, was elected as the new chairman of the board and CEO by the league’s board of directors.
The Chinese-language United Daily News on Monday reported that Chen had apparently relinquished the 25 percent of P.League+ shares he held.
As a result, the league’s announcement that Chen is to return as vice president was completely unexpected and confusing, commentator Chen Kai said.
“It makes sense that Richard Chang’s image as a successful basketball player-turned-entrepreneur could effectively help to repair the harm Blackie did to the league, but his return has weakened that effect,” Chen Kai said in a telephone interview.
Chen Kai also said the restructuring might have less to do with optimizing the league’s operations than the rumored upcoming merger of the P.League+ and T1 League.
The formal change would supposedly prevent the P.League+’s operation from being controlled by any one individual, but on the other hand, the league+ has still not clarified the responsibilities of Chang as chairman, particularly as he has said he joined the league “as a volunteer,” Chen Kai said.
“It is hard to tell how the newly formed P.League+ would operate because so much remains unknown,” he added.
Rather, it is clear that by establishing the P.League+ as an association, it has reached a formal balance with the T1 League, which has always operated as an association, Chen Kai said.
He said that the restructuring occurred only a few days after the P.League+ announced its new restrictions on the maximum number of imported players per quarter, which are now in line with those in the T1 League.
The picture would become clearer when more information is made public, he added.
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