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The aim is to have the new directors in place by August 15, the release said. The directors would also appoint a new chief executive officer, who will sit as an eleventh member of the new board.

According to a letter published on Wednesday, Hydro One and the province also agreed to a deal that included the retirement of Mayo Schmidt, the president and CEO of the company, the same day.

Among the other terms of his departure, Schmidt is to receive his base salary and his short-term bonus for 2018 prorated to Wednesday, in addition to a one-time lump sum cash payment of $400,000 that will be received “in lieu of all post-retirement benefits and allowances as provided in his contract or otherwise.”

The news at Hydro One is just the latest political maneuvering that has gone on around the utility, which boasts more than $25 billion in assets.

Hydro One has essentially been a political hot potato since the Liberal government that preceded Ford decided to privatize it back in 2015. Approximately 53 per cent of the utility, Ontario’s largest distributor and transmitter of electricity, has been sold to other investors. The money earned from the share sales had been earmarked by the now-deposed Liberals for infrastructure projects and paying off debt.

The province still owns more than 282 million shares of Hydro One, the combined value of which had dropped by around $211.8 million as 11:00 a.m.

Photo by Stan Behal/Toronto Sun/Postmedia Network

But Ford took special issue with Schmidt’s compensation and made firing Schmidt — dubbed “The Six-Million-Dollar Man” by Ford — a key campaign issue ahead of the June election that brought Ford and the Progressive Conservatives to power in Ontario.