2 March 2022
Dear Governors Van der Biest, Purnal, Lecomte, and Hogenboom,
Thank you for your petition to the RI Board regarding the membership of the Zone 13B Nominating Committee for the RI Director meeting in September 2022. The Executive Committee and RI Board reviewed and discussed your request at their February 2022 meeting.
Following its discussion, and on the recommendation of the Executive Committee, the Board adopted the following decision:
DECISION: The Board, having reviewed the request of the four governors in Zone 13B (Belgium) to limit the selection of the 2024–26 RI director from Zone 13B to the districts in Zone 13B rather than all of Zone 13, and noting that:
the current zoning plan adopted by the Board in 2016–17 created a new Zone 13 with the districts in France in Section A and the districts in Belgium in Section B and that at the time, the Board agreed Section A would have three director selections for every one selection from Section B;
at its June 2017 meeting, the Board, in response to petitions from 22 Rotary clubs in Belgium to reconsider its decision to place Belgium and France into one zone, requested the general secretary to inform those clubs that by creating a section of only Belgian districts, the Belgian Rotarians would be able “to elect their own director to the RI Board and determine their Rotary institute participation independent from the districts in the remainder of the zone. While this will not address all the concerns you raised, the Board hopes you will find this to be an acceptable outcome.”
the campaign initiated by Director Lhors to encourage the districts in France to adopt resolutions at their district conferences agreeing that the selection of the 2024–26 director from Zone 13B would be made by all the districts in the Zone was undertaken on his own initiative without any input from the Board, is contrary to the expressed wish of the Board stated in 2017, contrary to the stated desire of other RI directors, RI president, and general secretary, and unfair to the Rotarians in Belgium;
therefore requests the president, acting on behalf of the Board, to contact the governors of the 17 districts in Zone 13 that previously notified the general secretary that they agreed that the selection of the director from section B of Zone 13 should be made by representatives from the entire zone and request them to rescind their agreement and notify the general secretary accordingly no later than 1 April 2022.
Thank you for bringing this matter to the attention of the Board.
Sincerely,
John Hewko
cc: Roger Lhors, Director, RI
