Hanstholm Harbour: :
The problem harbor became municipal after years of chaos, but the problems began much earlier

2022 should have been the big turn-around year for the self-governing port Hanstholm Havn, which was completed after expansion to 650 million. Today, a year and a half later, the port has once again become municipal with a now public debt of DKK 630 million. and uncertain future prospects characterized by structural challenges, managerial chaos and political interference.

The plans were otherwise ready last year for an energy cluster at the port, and the advance agreement with the energy development company European Energy was just signed. Wind turbines and PtX with methanol production were supposed to replace the declining and hard Brexit-affected fisheries.

Besides a single freight route to Norway, fishing has been the only business in Hanstholm Harbour. And it continues to be. At the same time, the strength of the port has become a weakness with major consequences. The fishery has no prospect of golden times for the port, even though Europe's largest fish auction is located here. Owner and auctioneer Jesper Kongsted has a well-run business, but the fish are moving north.

- Three years ago I set it up so that we land the fish in Norway and have it driven the 2300 km to Hanstholm. Today, 40 per cent of our fish in that way from Norway, explains Jesper Kongsted and adds:

- In two years, I expect that 50 per cent of our fish comes here from Norway by truck.

But when the fish is driven through Norway, sailed to Hirtshals and again driven the last distance, then it is a problem for the Port of Hanstholm. The fish has to go over the edge of the quay, otherwise the port doesn't make money.

Therefore, the port has a turnover that in recent years has fluctuated between DKK 30-33 million. DKK - not enough to pay off a debt of DKK 630 million. DKK or create a profit. This resulted in an operating deficit of DKK 17 million in 2021. But at the turn of the year between 2021 and 2022, it was not yet known – because there was slight optimism with the plans for an energy cluster.

Business Development Director

At that time, the port's director was called Nils Skeby, and he had come to the port in August 2020 to kick-start business development. Nils Skeby both got the agreement with European Energy up and running and established a port council, where some of the port's largest companies are represented.

But Nils Skeby sat on a suspended post, and one of the harbor council members already feared for the director's future in autumn 2021.

- We must hold on to the port's director. We have had six different port directors in eight years. It is completely impossible to deal with as an independent. It puts some processes at a standstill when there are replacements in the management, says Jesper Pedersen, the second-generation owner-manager of Hanstholm Skibssmedie.

History speaks its own language. In the period 2014 to 2022, Hanstholm Havn had seven changes in the position of director.

In 2014, then director Birgitte Juhl Svendson was fired after a case involving consultancy work for the then chairman of the board of the port's board. After this, the retired technical director from Thisted Municipality, Torben Juul-Olsen, has been acting director twice. The second time when Henrik Carstensen changed to the same position in Grenaa Havn. Several centrally located sources also confirm that one of the others in the post, Niels Clemmensen, was fired, although the official explanation was different. An inspection of the port's audit protocol 2021 shows that Niels Clemensen received a severance pay paid until July 2021.

- It is with great regret that I have received Niels Clemensen's resignation, said the port's then board chairman Martin Vestergaard to several media in late summer 2020.

The forgotten chairman

But also the chairmanship of the port's board has changed hands so many times that the port's head of administration, Martin Bjerre, forgets one of them, Flemming Ipsen, in an overview in connection with a document inspection. However, the former Mærsk director is remembered by other sources at the port because he arrived at the board meetings in a Rolls Royce.

Ipsen replaced Martin Vestergaard, who resigned from his post in June 2016 because he wanted to devote himself to his job as an engineer, but already in September he returned to the position of chairman of the port.

The overview of board chairmen over the last ten years shows that the chair has changed hands seven times. Three of them in 2022.

Municipal elections and new harbor board

Local politicians have also influenced the operation and management of the port. After KV21, the incumbent mayor Ulla Vestergaard (S) had to hand over the chain to his deputy mayor Niels Jørgen Pedersen (V), who secured support from the conservatives on election night.

It also meant that the port got a new board in Hanstholm Havn, where the former Liberal politician, Minister of Taxation, Finance and Foreign Affairs Kristian Jensen became chairman of the board in Hanstholm Havn.

The well-known left-winger caused excitement in Hanstholm, and auction owner Jesper Kongsted still remembers that.

- Kristian Jensen, Thy Mors Energi, European Energy and Nils Skeby shut down the city, says Jesper Kongsted about the plans that involved an energy cluster with wind turbines and PtX production of green methanol.

Kristian Jensen fires director during exit

The excitement did not last long, because after a few weeks Jensen moved to the top position as CEO of Green Power Denmark. On his way out the door, he recommended director Nils Skeby for dismissal at the city council's finance committee due to "cooperation difficulties."

The magazine learns that the dismissal in front of the finance committee, among other things was justified by deputy director and operations manager Søren Zohnesen's stress-related sick leave. According to several sources, the sick leave coincided remarkably with the proposal for the dismissal, so that it appeared to several sources as an orchestrated argument for the dismissal.

Søren Zohnesen was not only employed in the port. Between 2018 and up to KV21, he sat on the city council for the Liberal Party, where he did not obtain re-election. During that period, the former harbor assistant advanced to deputy director and operations manager in December 2020, despite limited experience as a fishing skipper and no education other than the primary school leaving exam.

After the dismissal of Nils Skeby, Søren Zohnesen was appointed as port director in May 2022 after having been deputy director and operations manager for less than a year and a half. When the port became municipal on 1 January, he was appointed permanent port manager outside the municipality's finance committee. One of the committee's social democratic members wondered about the appointment.

- We could read in the newspaper that Søren Zohnesen had been hired as harbor manager, says long-standing city council member Peter Skriver Nielsen (S).

The appointment got the former parliament politician and locally rooted leftist Svend Heiselberg on the field.

- I can't say anything bad about Søren Zohnesen, who is also a leftist. But the question is whether he is the right one for the task, assessed Svend Heiselberg (V).

New board chairman with port experience

After Kirsten Hede, Kristian Jensen took office in March 2022, but he had barely entered the door of the boardroom before he announced his resignation to become director of Green Power Denmark. Michael Svane then took over as chairman of the board for the port in May 2022. The former branch director of DI Transport knew the port world from the inside

- It has been known for many years that Hanstholm has been a problem port due, among other things, to a large turnover in the port's management. This kind of thing creates unrest, and it is not good for a port, said Michael Svane in January 2023.

Even though he spent one to two days a week in Hanstholm, he did not succeed in reversing the poor economy.

- I ended up recommending that the municipality take the harbor back. The basis for the decision was, among other things, that they looked into a negative liquidity in the period 2021 to 2044, says Svane.

When the port's way into municipal management was decided in November last year, Mayor Niels Jørgen Pedersen (V) said:

- In the municipal council, we have a strong focus on having stronger management of Hanstholm Harbour. This also means that we investigate whether there are conditions in the financial management of the port that can form a basis for claiming responsibility.

At the same time, Thisted Municipality stated in a news item on its website:

"Furthermore, circumstances have been established that may give rise to liability."

Niels Jørgen Pedersen, however, had insight into the port's financial problems much earlier. The mayor sat on the finance committee in 2019, when the alarm bells rang in June. This appears from a risk assessment by a leading expert in the port area in the banking world, Danske Bank's managing director Morten Søegård. The assessment went to both the port's board and Thisted Municipality. And thus also the finance committee.

In the risk assessment, of which DOI.dk knows key parts, Danske Bank calls the expansion of Hanstholm Harbor a "high-risk project". Later in the email sent to then port director Niels Clemensen, it is stated that the port expansion could be "a threat to the municipality's finances".

Former mayor Ulla Vestergaard could not remember the risk assessment when we contacted her last month.

- It's not that I don't want to speak out, but I don't remember it at all. But now we have taken over the port in the municipality. A budget has been set, and it is a port which has had a down period. I am sure it will be a growth engine for the entire municipality, says Ulla Vestergaard.

Subsequently, Mayor Niels Jørgen Pedersen also stated the following to Nordjyske about the "high risk assessment" from Danske Bank:

"There was probably no doubt that it was. Not even in the municipal council.”

Several municipal politicians involved

But the mayor was not the only politician with prior knowledge of the port's financial challenges. Before the harbor became municipal, deputy mayor Jens Kr. Yde (K) on the board.

A document inspection of Hanstholm Harbor's audit reports shows that it was RSM Revision in Thisted that was responsible for the audit. Here was Jens Kr. Yde partner and managing director before becoming a member of the port's board and deputy mayor.

The state-authorised auditor who has audited Hanstholm Havn in the document inspection period from 2015 to 2022 is called Lennart Mouritzen. He cannot comment on the audit report, but confirms that Jens Kr. Yde was a partner and managing director of RSM Revision and a city council member at the same time.

- It was many years ago, and it is no secret, says Lennart Mouritzen, who himself lives in Hanstholm.

The publicly available CVR. information shows that it was not until 28 December 2021 that Jens Kristian Yde quit as CEO of RSM Revision. It is almost a year and five months ago today. Jens Kristian Yde confirms that he sat on the audit firm's board and management until the mentioned time, but he resigned the partnership seven years ago. Nor has he had knowledge of the content of the audit reports.

-I had nothing to do with the audit at all. I have stood completely outside the door with the audit, and I have had no financial interest in it either, says Jens Kristian Yde, who also well remembers Mayor Niels Jørgen Pedersen's words about responsible conditions.

- I think it may have something to do with departing chairmen. But it must be at Niels Jørgen's expense.

A city council member believes, however, that it is not fully known that Jens Kr. Yde has been in the management of the port's audit firm.

- It is a publicly known secret that you should preferably not talk about, says the social democrat Peter Skriver Nielsen, one of the very few politicians who asks questions about the process around Hanstholm Harbor in the finance committee.

None of the auditors' minutes mention conditions that could give rise to liability.

The politician who was fired from his official position in the port

But there is more than one city council politician who has had a business connection to the port at the same time as the political activity. Ib Poulsen (O) was employed as a harbor officer in Hanstholm Harbor way back when the harbor was state-owned. The Mærsk-educated captain got his job as a port officer in 1990 and the following year it became a civil servant position.

The politician also ended up sitting in Parliament twice between 2007-2011 and again between 2015-2019, where he was his party's fisheries rapporteur. At the same time, he has been a member of the town council in Thisted since 2001, where he has been a member of the municipality's important finance committee ever since. But when he had to return to his job as harbor officer after the second round in the Folketing, something happened.

- They thought there had been some structural changes, and it was only me who couldn't cope with the changes, says Ib Poulsen, who was fired from his civil service position.

It was a very expensive dismissal for the port.

- I was given a notice period of three years and three months. I will be paid until September 2024 and then my civil service pension, explains Ib Poulsen.

Well-placed sources say in agreement and without knowledge of each other's statements, that the current port manager Søren Zohnesen worked extremely hard to prevent Ib Poulsen from returning to his position after his leave. The sources also report that Søren Zohnesen openly said that he did not want Ib Poulsen back to work in the port.

Søren Zohnesen did not want to comment on the personnel matter in April 2022.

The port has become municipal, and this leaves Thisted Municipality with a hefty bill of DKK 530 million. DKK - a grace period has been achieved on the loan for five years, so the port must make money in five years at the latest. But as the port's last chairman said in January 2023, it requires more investment.

- Several people have asked me: 'How could you stand for that?' I could do that because there is a very large potential in Hanstholm Harbour. It still is. But it requires investment, and when the eternal unrest stops, then there is a golden future. The port can then either become an autonomous port or a limited company again later, says Michael Svane.

DOI.dk has tried in vain to get a comment from mayor Niels Jørgen Pedersen and port manager Søren Zohnesen on the content of this article.

This article is based on extensive research, document access and interviews that began in late 2021. Several interviews have been given under the promise of anonymity to the sources. The article also contains parts of articles previously published on DOI.dk.