This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on February 14, 2018

KUALA LUMPUR: Tan Sri Wan Zulkiflee Wan Ariffin, who took over the chief executive officer (CEO) and president office in 2015, will remain in the driver’s seat of Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) for at least three more years.

The national oil firm announced yesterday the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has renewed the tenure of its president and CEO Wan Zulkiflee, better known as Wan Zul, for three years, starting April 1, 2018.

In a statement yesterday, PMO said Wan Zulkiflee has an extensive experience in the country’s oil and gas (O&G) industry and that he has served Petronas for more than three decades.

“Wan Zulkiflee’s wide experience and his success in leading Petronas through various challenges over the past few years will ensure that Petronas will continue to do well and contribute to the country’s development,” it said.

Wan Zulkiflee, 57, started his career at Petronas in 1983 as a process engineer involved in developing several gas processing plants.

He has served Petronas in various capacities since 1983, including as vice president of gas business, chief operating officer and executive vice president of the group’s downstream business.

In 2010, Wan Zul was said to have been in the running to replace former Petronas CEO Tan Sri Hassan Marican before Tan Sri Shamsul Azhar Abbas was eventually selected. Many people cited his young age at that time as the barrier to Petronas’ top post.

Wan Zulkiflee took over the reins of the national oil firm in April 2015 after the onset of a severe downturn in the O&G industry following a collapse of crude oil prices.

An engineer by training, Wan Zulkiflee then renegotiated contracts with its contractors against the backdrop of sharply lower crude oil prices to achieve better cost efficiency in a harsh operating landscape.

Besides facing a plummet on earnings, he retrenched 1,000 employees and froze salary increments for top management from the vice-president and above due to a prolonged industry-wide slowdown.

This was a bold move as job retrenchment was unexpected in the national oil firm.