/IRBIS, Feb 20, 02/ - Kazakhstan Stock Exchange (KASE), along with the University of International Business (UIB) keeps polling the audience of its web site in Internet ( see more in the "Questions and Answers" section ( see more on "Corporate governance".

On Wednesday a new question is posted in this section:

Independent director - the member of the Board of directors of joint stock company. He is not and have not been for 3 years that preceded his election to the Board of directors (except for the cases of his reelection as an independent director), an affiliated person of the company and its affiliated persons, as well as did not participate in the auditing of the company during these periods (Draft of the new law "On joint stock companies"). Whose interests does such director represent?

Previous question concerned the information transparency of the company, namely, what completes it. There were 41 people, who answered it. Of this number:

• 51.2% (21 people) believes that the presence of the credit rating received from one of the international agencies reflects the transparency of the company;
• 29.3%% (12 people) gave preference to the admittance of the securities of the company into the listing of the Exchange (however, no specific names of the Exchanges were given);
• 17.1% (7 people) were in favor of the auditing by one of the "big five" companies;
• 2.4% (1 person) voted for the presence of "independent directors" within the Board of directors.

There were no other answer options though the audience could send them to their respective authors.

In the opinions of IRBIS specialists, the distribution of the answers is quite persuasive. The only surprising point is that most of the votes were thrown for the "big five" companies, since the presence of the auditing of the company is the mandatory listing requirement of the Exchange (anyway, at KASE for the admittance of the securities into the listing of category "A"). Any interested person can familiarize himself with the complete text of the auditing, including potential investors. Since the Exchange has other requirements for the companies on information disclosure, the preference of the Exchange's version over the "big five" version is clear.

Again, the initiator of this poll is the UIB. Based on the results of the poll presented by the University, the choice of the audience indicate that "there is a great deal work to be done for the Exchange over the information presented by the issuers".

As against the employees of IRBIS, the organizers of the poll noticed that only 18% of sufficiently professional respondents trust the auditors of the "big five", which may be the result of the international scandal over the auditing of the American energy giant ENRON by Arthur Andersen. The organizers of the poll also believe that the mistrust to auditing companies in Kazakhstan appeared after known cases with Neftekhimbank OJSC, Businessbank OJSC and Komirbank OJSC.

A few respondents who voted for the "independent directors" are explained by the poll organizers with the absence of widely known positive practice of such people in Kazakhstani companies, though "independent director" term is set forth by the Law "On joint stock companies".

The questions and answers posted by KASE are developed by UIB under the "Development of corporate governance principles in Kazakhstan" program (The program) funded by the Center for International Private Entrepreneurs (CIPE). The major goals of the Program are the creation of the basis for the introduction of corporate governance principles in Kazakhstan, securing greater transparency of the companies, study of problematic relations between the owners and the managers of the companies in Kazakhstan, defining the involvement of the society into the activities of the companies.

Under the program the organizers plan to increase the understanding of the corporate governance practice used now, and awareness of the officials in Kazakhstan, who are responsible for the legislature that protects the interests of the investors. In the opinions of the authors of the program, its implementation will stimulate better understanding of the corporate culture in the development of the companies.