I'd agree that Ilrek wasn't ideal as a leader, he was the best choice at the time when there were no other Maran leaders. During the entire time he was leader, there was pretty much nobody that I thought was even good enough to be Maran let alone leader (besides Ardryll, who was made leader and a few others that were showing a lot of potential just before the 5th age).

Ilrek was pretty good about letting Team Fort Imms know when he wasn't going to be around for extended periods of time and I really don't think many people struggled to get inducted to Fort. Seeing as how there wasn't really anyone else that we thought was fit to be leader, original poster think the cabal would have been better served by having no leader?