BuyHibs, which is led by club legend Pat Stanton and has the backing of the Supporters’ Association, the Hibernian Former Players’ Association and Supporters Direct Scotland, have launched a campaign to buy the Championship club from owner Sir Tom Farmer.
“We are delighted to learn that Pat Stanton is leading and has launched a campaign to encourage supporters to invest in the ownership of the club and fund its sporting ambitions,” said Dempster.
“We look forward to having a positive conversation with BuyHibs so that we can understand the full details of their proposals and how they are intended to both keep the club safe and take it forward.
“It is well known that the board has been consulting widely with supporters and is fine tuning its strategy for the future of the club.
"This will be presented to the existing 1,700 shareholders of the club at the forthcoming AGM and shared with supporters and the wider Hibernian family.
“This is a genuinely exciting period of change at the club and the board has consulted widely and will continue to listen to all contributions to make sure that all supporters are involved.”
The new group conducted a survey with Supporters Direct Scotland over whether there would be interest in supporters attempting to take the club back. They had over 4,000 responses with the majority favouring talks on community ownership.
Stanton, who made almost 400 appearances for Hibs and also managed the club in the 1980s, hopes to meet with Farmer and chairman Rod Petrie.
“The BuyHibs campaign has the ultimate aim of buying our club,” said Stanton. “We are in the fortunate position that the motivation for BuyHibs has not been generated from an emergency situation through a threatened insolvency like supporters of other clubs have been faced with.
“We want to be in a position where we can make a positive contribution to the long-term position of our club and to be ready to buy the club when the opportunity arises.
“We are asking fans to pledge to provide funds which will allow BuyHibs to drive positive change, and to give an indication of what size of stake is achievable.
“We are open to work with all Hibernian-minded people and groups who share the same goal.
“As a first step, we call on Sir Tom Farmer and Rod Petrie to meet with us to find and promote a positive and sustainable change for the betterment of Hibernian and to provide Sir Tom with a clear and deserved exit from the club he has backed for many years.”
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