JOHN BENNETT insists there is no appetite from Rangers' key investors to sell their shares at Ibrox as he vowed that one single shareholder will never again have complete control of the club.
Rangers have commenced legal proceedings against USA-based firm KRF Capital and Kyle Fox after rejecting an approach that could have seen a significant change of ownership as part of a multi-million pound share and capital proposal.
Bennett is one of the major shareholders in RIFC plc and has seen the likes of Stuart Gibson and John Halstead join the investor pool in recent years to help bolster the finances.
But the deputy chairman has ruled out any deal that would see the current money men look to cash in their chips and make a profit on the shares that they hold in Rangers.
Bennett said: "There has been speculation about the American group in particular recently, one of a number of groups who have come to talk to us and I believe that will continue to happen. The bit that surprised me was when I was in Amsterdam the noise levels seemed to go up a bit about potential sellers from within the Boardroom.
"I think I know Douglas Park as well as anyone can know Douglas Park, I know him well and I consider him a friend as well as the chairman of this football club. Douglas isn’t a seller and I’m not a seller.
"In fact, I’ve recently increased my position above five per cent and when the said American group did approach us I actually took that as an opportunity to sound out most of our big investors to say, ‘Look, where are you? What do you think of this?’
"And they rightly said, ‘Not only is there no harm in listening,’ and we do listen, we politely listen to a number of proposals and that will happen again I’m quite sure.
"No harm in listening, it’s the right thing to do as well from a fiduciary point of view, so we did we gave quite a lot of time to that situation and we listened.
"But what was very interesting from John Halstead to Julian Woldhardt to people in the Boardroom and outside, absolutely no interest in selling."
Rangers have seen the bottom line boosted thanks to on-field success and record-breaking transfers in recent months as the club have moved to a position of strength off the park.
And Bennett, in an interview with RangersTV, believes the mistakes of more than a decade ago will never be repeated as he seeks to ensure a widespread ownership base at Ibrox.
Bennett said: "Now, I’m also struck by the phrase ‘never again’ in this context. The phrase ‘never again’ was used at a time of regime change if you remember back in 2015.
"Never again can perhaps mean different things to different people, what I’m trying to get across is this is a board and a group of investors that really believes in ‘never again’ in terms of one individual or one party calling the shots and owning the club.
"This is my view and I know it’s a view shared by our current board that the ownership of Rangers football club should rest upon a number of shoulders. You know what can happen when one individual or one entity walks away.
"People can get bored, people’s lives can change, people’s priorities can change so when it’s resting on one set of shoulders as we’ve seen at Rangers Football Club, things can change.
"When you have a number of sets of shoulders to carry the load you’re not beholding to one individual walking away or something could befall that individual in their life or whatever. That’s what ‘never again’ means to me and my colleagues."
