Messier Likely to Fend Off Ouster Bid

In the executive suite of Vivendi Universal’s Paris headquarters Monday, Chairman Jean-Marie Messier and his staff were making the final arrangements for this week’s crucial annual meeting.

Across town at Vivendi’s sprawling television facility, where anti-Messier graffiti lines the halls, workers also are making final preparations for the Wednesday meeting. But they are packing up leaflets and T-shirts emblazoned with messages such as “Messier Super Liar” and “Messier Go Away.”

So it goes in the worlds of French culture and entertainment.

Messier, the American-loving leader of France’s largest media company, is sure to take a beating at the annual meeting. Socialists, union members and cultural elitists, who fear he is turning their nation’s film industry into the cinematic equivalent of McDonald’s, are planning to gang up on him and ask that he be removed.

A series of protests began a week ago when Messier fired the popular head of Vivendi’s Canal Plus subsidiary. Canal Plus is France’s largest pay TV network and finances most of the nation’s film production. Pierre Lescure, a former television anchor and 17-year head of Canal Plus is an icon of sorts in France, where he is seen as the protector of things French in media and entertainment.

Messier probably will weather the storm and move ahead with his dream of making Vivendi one of the world’s mightiest media and entertainment concerns, despite the anger some shareholders are likely to vent during the annual meeting. Vivendi Universal shares have dropped 35% this year amid concerns about Messier’s leadership and strategy.

A spokesman for Messier said he was unavailable for comment.

Even his most vocal critics acknowledged Monday that their calls for Messier to step down and Lescure to be reinstated are unlikely to be answered. Sources at Vivendi say Messier continues to enjoy the support of the board.

Also helping turn his fortunes was Sunday’s national elections. The Socialists, Messier’s most outspoken critics, are out. The center-right wing, where he stands as a well-established member, seems certain to win the runoff vote.

The first round of presidential elections brought crushing results for Socialist candidate Lionel Jospin and saw far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen finish second. Le Pen will face incumbent President Jacques Chirac in the next round of elections.

Though Chirac and Le Pen also had blasted Messier as a turncoat to French culture, much of the fiercest criticism came from left-wing politicians, including Jospin, who called on broadcasting regulators to investigate the Lescure firing. Communist politician Robert Hue, who lost badly in Sunday’s election, even proclaimed himself the “anti-Messier candidate.”

In the final days of the campaign, “L’affaire Lescure” as it has come to be known, was central in the debate of an otherwise uneventful campaign. And Vivendi protesters shared the front pages of leading newspapers with the biggest stories of the day.

But come Monday morning, all of France’s attention shifted to the election and Le Pen’s unprecedented showing.

Even at Vivendi’s headquarters, among employees and customers at the company’s cyber-cafe, the talk was more about Le Pen than Lescure.

Still, the ongoing and planned protests show that Messier has been unable to squelch the anger among Canal Plus die-hards over his decision to fire Lescure.

On Saturday, thousands of Canal Plus employees gathered at a rock concert in Paris to protest Messier’s leadership. Last week, 1,000 workers marched outside Vivendi’s headquarters off the Champs-Elysees to support Lescure.

Meanwhile, about 400 actors, including Catherine Deneuve and Juliette Binoche, have signed a petition demanding Lescure remain.

Messier argues that firing Lescure and bringing in a replacement from a rival sports TV channel in France were necessary to stem huge losses at Canal Plus.

“To an American audience, it’s a money-losing operation, so kill the head of it,” said Luc Hermann, a journalist who works with an investigative program produced by Canal Plus.

“It’s the way he was killed that bothers us. [Lescure] was the keeper of the Canal Plus spirit.”

In an effort to defuse the tensions, Messier called a group of top union leaders, producers and writers to a Sunday night meeting at which Messier gave assurances of continued support for Canal Plus and its independence.

Canal employees said the meeting was candid and courteous, but vowed to continue their protests. “He listened to us and we listened to him, but this changes nothing with the company,” said Gerard Chollet, leader of the largest union representing Canal Plus employees.

Nostalgia already is setting in.

Alain Shabat, producer of “Burger Quiz,” a Canal Plus game show in which contestants compete for hamburgers, walked into the dark Paris night Monday saying, “It’s sad, because for 17 years it was a lot of fun.”