Shen Antu was sure that those driving the charge were Shen Kaiping's former subordinates, led by Fan Shidiao and three others.
Shen Kaiping was a man with extremely strong feudal ideas, one of which was favoring sons over daughters. He also believed that his kingdom must be inherited by his own sons. Otherwise, after the death of his "legitimate son", he would not have found five illegitimate sons and trained them as the next heirs.
This means that although Shen Kaiping is loyal and treats well his old subordinates who once fought with him to build the empire, he will not give them too much power. Except for his good brother Fan Shidiao and two others, all other subordinates who once followed Shen Kaiping are given sinecure positions.
Shen Antu once privately speculated that if Shen Kaiping could become emperor, he would definitely give up military power over a glass of wine. Maybe he did intend to do so at first, but the appearance of Shen Antu broke his plan.
Shen Kaiping was worried that Shen Antu would ruin his empire, so he specifically told his old subordinates to keep an eye on him. The old subordinates had long been resentful of Shen Kaiping's intentional or unintentional suppression. Now with Shen Kaiping's "imperial edict", they could finally usurp the power of the group on his deathbed. Shen Antu had a hard time when he first took over Jinsheng. Later, he replaced many old employees of the company with thundering means and trained his own people, so that his life became a little better, but this does not mean that they have completely disappeared.
Shen Antu thought a lot in a flash, and the elevator had just arrived at the destination. Before leaving, Shen Chao blatantly poached him: "Secretary Simon, you have been with my brother for so many years, and your abilities are obvious to all. Now that my brother is gone, your abilities cannot be buried. Do you want to consider joining me? I promise that you will still be the chairman's chief secretary, how about it?"
Simon still maintained his impeccable smile: "Thank you for your kindness, Mr. Shen. It's getting late. Let's go into the venue first, shall we?"
Shen Chao looked like he couldn't do anything to him: "Okay, okay, let's talk about it after the meeting."
Shen Chao's confidence was about to overflow, and Shen Antu rolled his eyes.
As usual, there was an opening speech before the meeting started. In the past, Shen Antu would just say a few brief remarks. Today, the speaker was Fan Hong. No one knew who wrote the speech for him, but it was long and boring. He talked about the founding of Jinsheng all the way to today. Some people in the audience even dozed off.
Finally, Fan Hong got to the point.
"Our young chairman Shen Lin is missing and the group is in crisis. Someone must lead Jinsheng forward. This is the purpose of convening everyone to this shareholders' meeting today. We need to elect new directors, and then the board of directors will select a new chairman..."
When Shen Antu was still in the company, there were 11 directors in total, 6 of whom were his people. But now that new directors are to be elected, all of Shen Antu's forces will inevitably be replaced. This is expected.
15 days before the shareholders' meeting, undercurrents were surging in Jinsheng. It was unknown what kind of transactions someone made in order to canvass votes.
Shen Antu was sitting on a lounge chair on the second-floor balcony, smoking a cigarette. He was watching the real-time surveillance on his phone while predicting the new board of directors. First of all, Fan Hong, Shi Xiaodong, and Diao Yongzhou would not change. Shen Antu's connections among shareholders should be able to keep Yu Keyan, and Lin Miao would continue to stay on the board of directors. The next one should be Shen Chao, and the rest would be to pick people from Fan Shidiao's faction.
The voting process was very slow. Shen Antu even took the time to talk to Xie Duo on the phone for half an hour. Xie Duo's plane had just landed and he was on his way to the hotel.
"Have you had breakfast?" Xie Duo asked.
"Yes. I woke up very early today and arrived at Yu Shui before 8 o'clock. I will take a hot spring bath before having lunch." Shen Antu focused his attention on the shareholders' meeting and said to Xie Duo in a cheerful tone, "By the way, I just found out that there is also a golf course on the rooftop here. I will try it this afternoon..."
After the call with Xie Duo, the voting results of the shareholders' meeting were almost out. Shen Antu guessed 10 of the 11 directors. In addition to the 6 he confirmed, there were another 5 executives and investors, 4 of whom were close confidants of Fan Shidiao and the other two.
Because of the special circumstances, 11 directors voted out the chairman on the spot at the shareholders' meeting. Shen Antu sat up from the recliner with his mobile phone in his hand.
Shen Chao was extremely happy after being elected as a director. He deliberately said loudly to the people around him that it was really difficult to vote. He didn't know who to vote for, and didn't care about the awkward smiles of the people around him. Simon silently looked in the direction of Shen Chao, and the camera on his chest was also facing Shen Chao. Shen Antu couldn't help rolling his eyes again.
Ten minutes later, the results of the chairman election came out, and the person who read it out was Fan Hong again. He was surprised for a moment, and then he smiled. That smile on his face looked naive, just like Maitreya Buddha. He said to the microphone on the podium: "After a joint vote by 11 directors, the new chairman of Jinsheng Group is..."
"Our President Shi, Comrade Shi Xiaodong!"
The camera on the phone first turned to Shi Xiaodong, then to Shen Chao. Shi Xiaodong just smiled faintly, then walked up to the podium amid the applause of the crowd. And Shen Chao... Almost everyone was looking at Shen Chao, who was dumbfounded, his face pale, and his originally festive dark red suit became a blatant joke.
Soon, Shen Chao recovered and left the venue angrily, and no one dared to stop him.