Caniwi Capital executive chairman Troy Bowker.
An investment firm businessman has gone on the offensive, saying he promotes free speech after NZME’s chair questioned the political motivation of some of those seeking to overthrow the board of the media company. NZME’s CEO and BusinessDesk’s founding editor have in turn responded.
An NZME shareholder has hit back at the media company’s board for quoting a text message he says has been taken out of context in what amounts to a personal attack on him by the company chair to “protect her position”.
Caniwi Capital executive chairman Troy Bowker says he is “astounded” NZME chair Barbara Chapman – whom he says he has not spoken to or met – and the NZME board had used information to target him without checking the context or accuracy.
Bowker, whose company and nominee accounts hold just over 3.5% of NZME, says he is a champion of free speech: “I definitely do not think media should only cater for one perspective: quite the opposite.”
Bowker has been proposed by Auckland businessman Jim Grenon as an alternate director of NZME as part of Grenon’s plans to clean out the media company board.
The NZME board yesterday went on the attack over Grenon’s plan, defending the company’s performance and raising concerns about governance, editorial independence and the lack of a vision.
“The quality of journalism debate is very different from the choice of political leaning,” Chapman said, in a board letter released to the NZX.
“With over two million readers, NZ Herald takes a deliberate position of being as broad as possible. We do this to maximise audience and revenue.
“We believe some supporters of Mr Grenon are motivated by supporting certain political perspectives.”
An example of this, she said, was a letter Grenon sent the NZME board on Sunday, in which he suggested Bowker be appointed as an alternate director to an original nominee, Caniwi Capital managing director Des Gittings.
“Mr Bowker being an individual who has been reported as having made comments that are against appealing to a wide range of perspectives,” wrote Chapman.
The letter quotes a BusinessDesk story by founding editor Pattrick Smellie in early March which cited a Bowker text message to Smellie in July 2023: “With subscription services that claim to be a business news site, I don’t want to read any stories that piss me off.”
Chapman said: “We worry what this might do to maintaining a broad audience and its impact on staff and revenue.”
In a statement to the Herald, Bowker took aim at Chapman and the BusinessDesk article and challenged NZME to release text messages he says he has previously exchanged with NZME chief executive Michael Boggs. Boggs and Smellie respond to Bowker’s assertions below.
Bowker said the BusinessDesk article had contained “numerous factual inaccuracies” which, in his view, were “deliberately misleading”.
He was “equally astounded” that Chapman had chosen to reproduce snippets of the article “without even checking its accuracy and then use it in a shareholders’ letter as a way to attack me and protect her position”.
He said his texts with Smellie related to a long “back and forward” about some of the content of articles published by BusinessDesk.
“Until the March 6 article, I had assumed our discussions, some light-hearted banter, to be private. For clarity, I was making the point that BusinessDesk is a business news subscription site and should not be engaging in social commentary with a left political bias. Subscribers to BusinessDesk are paying for good quality business news, not poor quality bias opinion pieces.
“If the transcript of the discussion was accurately reproduced, the text extract should have had me saying that modern subscription-based media needs to serve up content that better resonates with its target audience.
“I definitely do not think media should only cater for one perspective: quite the opposite. I’m a big believer in free speech and I think the media needs more diverse views, not less.
“However, BusinessDesk subscribers don’t pay for social commentary; they want business articles.”
Bowker said the March 6 article was “just another example of poor quality journalism, not to mention a lack of integrity from someone I thought I knew pretty well”.
“I’ve known Pattrick for a long time and in fact have hosted him several times in my corporate box. So it is not unusual for Pattrick and I to engage in friendly debates via text or over the phone. He’s usually a pleasant and bright guy but has let his integrity and journalism standards drop on this occasion.”
He claimed the text message quoted in the article and subsequent NZME letter had been cherry-picked.
“I have also corresponded on a number of occasions with NZME’s CEO Michael Boggs about my concerns about BusinessDesk. He agreed with me in texts and phone calls.”
He invited the Herald to ask Boggs and Smellie to disclose the texts.
He claimed Boggs had complained to him about NZME paying a lot of money for BusinessDesk and expected quality business-related content, not social commentary.
“This was the point I was making to Pattrick.
“I challenge the NZME board to publish the texts between Michael Boggs and I. If the NZME board wishes to engage in personal attacks on shareholders then they should also publish their own CEO’s texts, which agree with my position.”
In response to a series of questions, Boggs told the Herald: “As CEO I have regular engagement with a number of NZME shareholders, including Troy Bowker. However, I don’t believe I have ever engaged with him about what we paid for BusinessDesk or the quality of its content.”
Smellie told the Herald that he stood “by the way I have reported Troy’s views but do not want to get into a public tit for tat with him”.
He said when Bowker’s involvement in the NZME board cleanout bid was revealed, “I made a judgment that that text exchange was relevant to understanding one of the bidders, none of whom were responding to interview requests.
“I regret that this has damaged a previously cordial relationship in which there was always a fair bit of disagreement on many subjects but [I] stand by its use in the important context of debate about editorial independence,” Smellie said.
He believed Bowker’s separate comments about being a believer in free speech and that BusinessDesk subscribers don’t pay for social commentary were ”inherently contradictory” and supported his original point.
He said Bowker had not contacted him about any “alleged inaccuracies”.
“I’m not aware of what Troy and Michael Boggs may have discussed. Nothing has ever been raised with me.”
A response from NZME’s board has been requested.
Troy Bowker established Caniwi Capital in 2008 when he returned home to New Zealand after 11 years in London and New York. The NBR Rich List estimated his value in 2018 at $84 million.
In 2021, Bowker was at the centre of a media firestorm after he accused Sir Ian Taylor on LinkedIn of “sucking up to the left Māori-loving agenda”.
Bowker was a shareholder of the Hurricanes Super Rugby franchise at the time and his comments drew the ire of the likes of then Hurricanes star and All Black TJ Perenara and several Labour Government politicians.
Bowker exited as a Hurricanes shareholder soon after the controversy, saying the move had been in the making for many months, as the franchise had been working through a capital restructure in preparation for the expiry of its then license term.
He said at the time that his comments to Taylor were “never intended to involve rugby or my involvement with the Hurricanes as a shareholder or board director”.
“However, it is clear that this has become the central focus for the media rather than the important issues around New Zealanders being proud of the many incredible historical achievements of all of our ancestors, whether they be European, Māori or any other lineage.”
Bowker has donated in the past to former Labour MP Stuart Nash, as well as donations in 2021 to both NZ First and the Act Party. After the controversy, Nash said: “I’ve made it clear I won’t be taking any more donations from Troy.”
Bowker told the Herald in 2022 that he supported “politicians on the political right who oppose Labour and who will play a crucial role in 2023 in removing Labour”.
“I’m in the fortunate position to assist and I intend to keep doing so until this Labour Government is gone,” he said.
Bowker said NZ First leader Winston Peters would be “judged very favourably in years to come for his outstanding contribution to democracy and freedom of speech in New Zealand for many years”.
Peters told the Herald at the time that Bowker was a “friend”.
“Mr Bowker is a friend of mine. He happens to believe in free speech,” Peters said. “He happens to believe in one standard of citizenship in our country and perchance, so have I all my life.”
Act Party leader David Seymour said in 2022 that he would not have written the comments that got Bowker in trouble, but said he would not be copying Nash in refusing Bowker’s donations.
“I would not have written what Troy wrote myself, but Act believes in free speech and opposes the kind of self-righteous pile-ons where a person is ostracised for an opinion.”
Editor-at-Large Shayne Currie is one of New Zealand’s most experienced senior journalists and media leaders. He has held executive and senior editorial roles at NZME including Managing Editor, NZ Herald Editor and Herald on Sunday Editor and has a small shareholding in NZME.
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