KUALA LUMPUR (July 30): The Prime Minister's Department (PMO) announced today the appointment of Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad as chairman of Khazanah Nasional Bhd with immediate effect.

In a statement today, the PMO also named Economic Affairs Minister Datuk Seri Mohamed Azmin Ali; Tan Sri Mohd Hassan Marican, a former chief executive officer and president of Petroliam Nasional Bhd; Dr Sukhdave Singh, a former deputy governor of Bank Negara Malaysia; and Goh Ching Yin, a former executive director of market development at the Securities Commission Malaysia, as directors of the sovereign wealth fund.

The appointment of Khazanah's new group managing director will be announced in due course, it added.

This follows the en masse resignations of Khazanah's group managing director Tan Sri Azman Mokhtar and eight other board members last Thursday (July 26), who had offered their resignations to Dr Mahathir "to facilitate a smooth and orderly transition under the new government".

The other board members comprised Datuk Seri Nazir Razak, Tan Sri Md Nor Md Yusof, Tan Sri Mohamed Azman Yahya, Datuk Mohammed Azlan Hashim, Tan Sri Andrew Sheng Len Tao, Tan Sri Raja Arshad Raja Uda, Datuk Nirmala Menon, and Yeo Kar Peng.

In response, Dr Mahathir said on Friday (July 27) he "welcomed" the offers of resignation from the entire board of Khazanah, adding that it will "enable the government to restructure the sovereign wealth fund accordingly".

The premier also emphasised that the government was "not on a witch hunt".