Governor Made Aware of Montenegro’s Firing

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Governor Lolo Moliga was notified over the weekend of the termination of the CEO of BlueSky Aoee Adolfo Montenegro.

Montenegro who has been at the helm of BlueSky for 8 years and is largely credited with the expansion of the phone company to Samoa, Cook islands and New Zealand was fired by Amper, Bluesky’ s parent company Saturday.

The firing was through an email to managers from Jamie Espinosa CEO of Amper , who has appointed himself as the interim CEO.

The email indicated that the termination of Montenegro’s services was done in consultation with Amalgamated Telecom Holdings, the Fiji company that Amper’s Board of Directors has approved as the new owners of BlueSky.

The Amper Board of Directors has accepted the $79.1 million offer from ATH for BlueSky and the sale is to be formalized by shareholders at a meeting early next week in Spain, where Amper is headquartered.

ASG has a 1/3 ownership stake in ASH Cable, the management company that the former CEO of Bluesky Montenegro headed to operate the undersea fiber optic cable connecting the Samoas and Hawaii.

The ownership is through $9 million of public money that was invested in the cable.

Governor Lolo Moliga has said that he wants to keep the ownership of BlueSky in American Samoa, to protect investments by local residents in the company and also protect local jobs.

Asked for comments from the administration regarding Montenegro’s termination, the governor’s executive assistant Iulogologo Joseph Pereira acknowledged that the governor was informed of this action.

He said the governor’s instructions to the team headed by the Attorney General is “to make sure that our people’s jobs with Blue Sky are secured; our economic interests are not compromised, and our investments in ASH Cable are protected.”

Iulogologo said the team is exploring appropriate actions to be recommended to the governor and lt. governor for their decision that will accomplish these stated objectives.

The team will report back to the governor and lt. governor on its recommendations.

Other than the AG, others in the team assigned to the BlueSky sale are Iulogologo, Governor’s Legal Cousel Steve Watson and Director of Commerce Keniseli Lafaele.

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