Industry insiders say Robert Rabinovitch, executive vp and chief operating officer of Claridge Inc., is the Liberal government’s first choice to replace crtc chairman Keith Spicer when his term expires next summer.

Rabinovitch, one of the so-called three wise men making up the government-appointed direct-to-home satellite policy review panel, is also treasurer of the Samuel and Saidye Bronfman Family Foundation and the CRB Foundation. He is a former deputy minister of communications and under-secretary of state.

Sources say an offer has already been extended, but are skeptical that Rabinovitch will be inspired to leave a lucrative position with the Bronfman’s corporation in favor of the regulator’s hot seat. Given the regulatory issues surrounding convergence, this is no time for an interim chair and an announcement is expected before Spicer exits in June.

Should Rabinovitch bow out, crtc commissioner David Colville, who served as interim chair when Spicer headed up the Citizens’ Forum on Canada’s Future in 1990/91, is also a potential candidate, although sources say that Colville’s promotion to vice-chairman responsible for telecommunications at the end of September make a new assignment so soon unlikely.

In tandem with the chair appointment, the government is in the process of filling two vacant crtc seats after terms for commissioners Adrian Burns and Edward Ross ran out July 27. Burns, a former Calgary news anchor, editor and producer, has left a void in Western representation, while the departure of Burns, a Montreal-based business executive, begs a new Quebec rep. A third seat will become vacant Dec. 3 when part-time commissioner Robert Gordon’s term ends.

Francoise Bertrand, former president and director general of Radio-Quebec, Francis Fox, former communications minister under the Trudeau Liberals, and Lawrence Cannon, a former Quebec politician, are reportedly being considered. Linda Rankin, who pitched the Women’s Television Network application and left her position as president of wtn this summer over programming decisions, is thought a likely candidate from the West.

According to one crtc insider, staff are curiously eyeing the length of terms assigned the new appointees.

Although commissioners can serve terms of up to five years, the most recent appointment, a three-year term for lawyer Andree Wylie in March, was the shortest in memory for a full-time commissioner.

Previous to Wylie, five-year terms were extended commissioners Garth Dawley, Yves Dupras, Gail Scott, and Peter Senchuk, all of which, like Wylie’s, conclude in 1998.

Of the 10 members who currently make up the board, no appointments extend beyond that year. ‘If the next appointments are three years, you have to wonder what’s in store for the crtc in 1998,’ says one executive. AV