Ex-TAP director may have to return €500,000 compensation package

Alexandra Reis, the former director of Portugal’s State-run airline TAP who received a €500,000 compensation package after serving just under 2 years in the job, may now have to refund the payout.

Portugal’s financial management institute, IGF – a tax inspection body — has found irregularities in the compensation package and the director will likely have to return the money as the IGF points the finger at TAP chairman Manuel Beja for being responsible for allowing the compensation.
The revelation over the golden handshake affair resulted in several heads rolling, including the former minister for Infrastructure, Pedro Nuno Santos who initially said he knew nothing about the payout, but later admitted that he had authorised it via WhatsApp.
A parliamentary inquiry has opened into the state of TAP and its privatisation, and Nuno Santos and the ex-Minster of Planning and Infrastructure, Pedro Marques, the ex-TAP director Diogo Lacerda Machado, and ex-Secretary of State for Finances, Ricardo Mourinho Felix are to be called before the Parliamentary Commission on Economy, Public Works, Planning and Housing.
Two weeks ago the online news site ECO reported that the privatisation of TAP in 2015 had been indirectly paid for by the airline itself rather than the purchasing shareholder, Brazilian-American airline tycoon David Neeleman who cut an offset deal with Airbus by upping the number of planned aircraft lease purchases from around 15 to over 50. Neeleman denies this.