"You have to beg"

Chamber of Commerce: Elected, but not present?

Not all Chamber of Commerce mandataries have been characterized by a particularly high level of commitment in the past. Will this change in the coming years?

(Bild: Evelyn Hronek)

The Carinthian Chamber election is over, now it's time to get to work - or is it? There are accusations of a lack of attendance.

Exactly 886 electoral mandates will be distributed based on the provisional results of the Chamber of Commerce elections in Carinthia. Quite a lot - isn't it? Admittedly, there are a total of 94 specialist organizations, i.e. various specialist groups, guilds and committees to be filled. And in Salzburg, where almost as many people live as in Carinthia, there are even 922 mandates.

As reported, the Wirtschaftsbund under WK President Jürgen Mandl was able to maintain its position of power - but had to accept losses of around ten percentage points; the loud applause for the (presumably also future) president during the presentation of the results was probably due to the fact that the ÖVP Bund had expected a drop of up to 20 percentage points after the peace elections in 2020.

Not attended a single meeting in five years
On the same day, Mandl emphasized the numerous tasks that need to be done to strengthen the business location. The premise is that work must continue diligently. He is probably right about that. However, not all functionaries - regardless of party affiliation - have shared this attitude towards work in the past. Even during the election campaign, criticism was repeatedly voiced that one or two mandataries were not taking their responsibilities in the chamber quite so seriously: "There are entrepreneurs who haven't been to a single meeting in five years," the "Krone" confirms.

Well, now it could be argued that most of the functionaries (apart from the division chairman and his deputy, the specialist group chairman and, of course, the presidium) work on a voluntary basis and are also busy running their company.

In some cases, committee chairmen have to run after members, practically begging them to attend meetings.

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Committees do not have a quorum
However, this bad habit degenerated to such an extent that committees in some specialist groups were no longer even quorate due to a lack of attendance. "Sometimes, as committee chairperson, you have to run after the members, practically begging them to attend the meetings - or at least pass on their voting rights so that resolutions can be passed," said an annoyed businessman in an interview with Krone. And this is particularly the case in specialist groups with a "diverse" composition. It will be interesting to see how many of the 886 mandataries will actually find time for their function in the coming years...