Walt Disney’s daughter Diane Disney-Miller has finally spoken out about the power struggles at the top of the company that bears her father’s name. Speaking to the LA Times (free subscription and well worth it), she said that Michael Eisner had done some “great things for the company” but that it was “time to step down and let someone else come in for the future”. Although she agrees in principal with her cousin Roy Disney’s attempts to bring in a new company chief, Diane feels that Roy’s move came too early and has turned into a “vicious and personal” campaign to oust Eisner. “Roy loves the company as much as I do, and he wants to see it remain independent too. But what he has done has put it in jeopardy”, she says. “It showed there is weakness and discord at the top”.

Diane’s relationship with Roy has reportedly been “tense” over the years, since her cousin carried out similar action in 1984 to remove her husband Ron Miller as the company’s CEO, paving the way for the “Team Disney” hiring of Eisner, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Frank Wells. The family says that in recent years their relationship has been “patched up”. On the removal of Eisner from the top spot, Diane was adamant that his departure be orderly but be enforced by the board if he resists. “You don’t want him ripped from the company because there is nobody to take his place,” she said. “I want it to be his decision to go but, Michael being who he is, I don’t think that will happen”. Explaining why she has decided to publicly come forward now, Diane said that it was in response to Comcast’s acquisition bid last month. “We’re so sad. We feel helpless. If this company ever loses its independence it will never be what it had been. This should not be a subsidiary of a cable company”. In a letter to the company board, she urged them to keep Disney independent “for what it represents in entertainment and what the man [Walt Disney] himself represents”.