An ?“abstention” is simply a voter’s (shareholder or director) decision not to vote. This means that the abstention does not count as a ?“yes” or ?“no” vote. The abstention is treated as ?“this director or shareholder is not voting.”
Shadolane, By abstaining Sarissa is signaling that it is not happy with the current BOD of AMRN. Apparently, AMRN has not taken Sarissa's attempts to discuss ways they believe management could improve profitability and instead has ignored what is their largest shareholder. Sarissa believes they have the the right to call for a special shareholder meeting and advance their own slate for the BOD. (My opinion is this strengthens my view that KM (so far) has not proven himself to be a very good CEO.)
I think a vote against is very effective, you can’t get elected if the against exceeds the yes votes. I think they used abstain as a way to not show which directors they want to keep. I say fire them all and start fresh.
We can't actually vote them out -- no shot at that -- and we show support for Sarissa by also voting to abstain.
It does not allow the company to vote the shares as they wish. "Abstains" are reported separately from Yes and No. Depending on the rules for each vote, they are either completely removed from the overall Yes/No total, or they effectively act as a No if a majority of all shares is required to pass a resolution.