James Murdoch Re-Elected as BSkyB Chair

LONDON: James Murdoch has been re-elected as the chairman of BSkyB, with 81.24 percent voting in his favor at the company’s annual shareholder meeting and 18.76 percent against.

Around one-third of independent shareholders voted against his reappointment, including Standard Life Investments, which manages more than 6 million shares in BSkyB. Murdoch is the deputy chief operating officer of News Corp., which owns a majority 39.1 percent of the company and controls the most voting rights. News Corp. had to abandon its attempt to take the remaining 61 percent of BSkyB in July when the details of the phone hacking surfaced.

Many have called for his resignation because of his links to the News of the World phone-hacking scandal, though others argue in his defense that he was not running the newspaper division when the hacking took place.