Royal Greenlandic boss faces axe

SIKU CIRCUMPOLAR NEWS

Last week, in Reykjavik, Iceland, the home rule government’s minister for industry, Johan Lund Olsen, apparently told two reporters from Greenland and Denmark that Keld Askær, the director of the seafood giant Royal Greenlandic, was going to be fired.

Since then, Olsen has been scrambling to distance himself from his comments — part of a conversation held over a beer with the two reporters from Nuuk’s Sermitsiaq newspaper and the Danish Ritzau news service.

Royal Greenland has been publicly lukewarm about the home rule government’s plan to change its one-price policy for utilities in Greenland, a move that would significantly raise costs for the government-owned corporation.

Royal Greenland has threatened to shut down several shrimp plants in Greenland if Greenland’s uniform pricing system for power ends.

But another home rule government minister said Royal Greenland would tow the line with any new government policy because it’s owned by the state.