State-owned holding company Gazprom-Media has a 66-percent stake in Ekho Moskvy, while the remaining 34 percent is owned by journalists of the radio station.
Venediktov said in a statement on the radio station's website that Ekho Moskvy journalists are perplexed by the decision and that Gazprom-Media should provide an explanation.
"After all, the annual meeting where the board of directors is supposed to change was scheduled to take place in June, and this kind of haste needs an explanation," the statement said.
Venediktov noted in messages on his Twitter account that the editor-in-chief, not the board of directors, decides the radio station's editorial policy and that Gazprom-Media did not demand his resignation from that post.
But in his statement on the Ekho Moskvy website, he implied that the radio station's owner was reacting to recent criticism of the station by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
"We understand that Gazprom-Media could not refrain from responding to the criticism of high-ranking Russian officials regarding the radio station," the statement said.
"We assure our listeners that Ekho Moskvy's editorial policy was and will be based on the laws of the Russian Federation in the interests of the public good, as, strictly speaking, the radio station has worked to this day," it said.