Rangers director John Gilligan has told fans that paying Mike Ashley back his £5m loan now would not be in the best interests of the club or company.
Gilligan made the statement at Rangers general meeting at Ibrox today.
He told fans that Ashley will still have 49% of Rangers retail once the loan has been repaid.
Ashley had no representative present at the meeting, which he called last month as he seeks repayment of the £5million loan he agreed with the former Rangers board earlier this year. The businessman also posed questions over why Rangers International Football Club plc was delisted from the AIM stock exchange in the aftermath of the regime change that saw Dave King, Paul Murray and Gilligan sweep to power in March.
Ashley, who has a nine per cent shareholding at Ibrox, also wanted to know "under what terms the £1,500,000 loan provided to the company by Messrs Douglas Park, George Letham and George Taylor was made available to the company and how that sum was subsequently made available to the club".
But there was no representative from the Ashley camp amongst the several hundred strong crowd at Ibrox.
The shareholder summit lasted around half an hour before Resolutions 1 and 2 were voted on. Fans and investors are now waiting on the final results being announced, which is likely to happen on Monday. Supporters asked a range of questions to Paul Murray, who chaired the meeting, company secretary James Blair and director John Gilligan.
The GM was held the day after Sports Direct won a High Court case in London that prevents the Gers board from disclosing details of the retail contracts in place between the two parties.
The board were unable to answer questions relating to the Sports Direct deals but Murray confirmed Rangers hope to list on the ISDX stock market in the coming months.
He also said that Dave King's consortium had already spent £8m between them on the club and confirmed that the announcement of a new manager was due next week.
However, when asked why the club is continuing to pay former manager Ally McCoist, Gilligan said: "The company entered into a contract with the ex-manager. The company has an obligation and we're honouring the contract. We're doing the right thing.
"Unless he changes his mind, he will stay on gardening leave until December."
Rangers are eager to have the Sports Direct deals renegotiated to the benefit of the club and fans have been left furious with the stance and actions of Ashley. Many supporters continue to refuse to buy official Rangers merchandise and there have been calls for the boycott to be stepped up as they bid to force Ashley back to the table.
Rangers First director Ricki Neill said: "Rangers First shall be viewing the outcome of events at [today's] general meeting with extreme interest. We would also hope that the executive team of Sports Direct realise that the current commercial arrangements are of absolutely no financial benefit to either party.
"We will also be contacting all our members in the coming days regarding the club's partnership with Sports Direct. This is clearly a very strong issue amongst the Rangers support right now and we would like to know exactly the thoughts and feelings of all RF members on this matter."
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