Former Caltex boss named Pertamina chief

JAKARTA (JP): President Abdurrahman Wahid appointed on Monday former president of oil company PT Caltex Pacific Indonesia Baihaki Hakim as the new president of state oil and gas company Pertamina, replacing Martiono Hadianto.

Abdurrahman, nicknamed Gus Dur, also appointed six new directors of the state company to assist Baihaki in carrying out his job. The new directors are mostly from within Pertamina.

Gus Dur said Baihaki and the new directors faced a tough job of turning the most strategic state company into an efficient and world-class company amid the increasingly competitive global oil industry.

"The new directors of Pertamina should work out a strategy to face a seriously challenging century after the year 2003, that is globalization. If Pertamina is not well prepared, it will be beaten out by others," Gus Dur said at the ceremony to install Baihaki and the new directors.

"In the past, Pertamina acted as a Trojan horse to enrich certain groups. (The anticorruption efforts) that were initiated by the previous management should be continued by the new directors," Gus Dur said.

Pertamina was considered the country's worst symbol of corruption for several decades due to the deep involvement of the family and cronies of former president Soeharto in its business.

A graduate of the Bandung Institute of Technology, Baihaki, who was born in Sijunjung, West Sumatra, on Dec. 3, 1942, led Caltex Pacific Indonesia, a joint venture of American firms Chevron and Texaco, from 1994 to the end of 1999.

Baihaki is the first executive of a foreign contractor to hold the position of Pertamina president.

Another outsider appointed to Pertamina's board of directors on Monday is Ainun Naim, 39, who was research and electronics development program (EDP) coordinator at Gadjah Mada University's master management program in Yogyakarta. He was installed as Pertamina's new finance director.

Some sources claim Ainun is part of the inner circle of People's Consultative Assembly Speaker Amien Rais and Minister of Finance Bambang Sudibyo.

Other members of the board are exploration and production director Gatot K. Wiroyudo, who previously headed the Foreign Contractors Management Body (BPPKA); processing director Arifin Nawawi, who was previously the president of liquefied natural gas producer PT Arun NGL Co; Iham Syarif, who maintains his position as director of shipping, communication and ports; director of general affairs Syahrial Daud, who was previously the head of Pertamina's foreign marketing department; and director of domestic provision Harry Purnomo, who was previously a division head at the domestic provision department.

Baihaki vowed to improve Pertamina's efficiency and turn it into a world-class company.

He also vowed to be professional, brushing aside the worries of some parties that he could favor foreign contractors over local contractors given his position at the foreign oil company.

"The worries of some parties that I will give preference to foreign contractors are not correct. I am an Indonesian and my mission is clearly for the nation's interest," Baihaki said after being installed.

Oil and gas expert Ramses Hutapea said he was pessimistic that Baihaki could successfully transform Pertamina into a profit- oriented company as long as the government continued taking all of its profit and did not allow it to be financially independent.

He said some people could have high expectations of Baihaki given his career in Caltex, but he warned that Pertamina was far more complex than Caltex.

Ramses, however, believed Baihaki would not favor foreign contractors over local ones.

"The House of Representative will also closely watch Pertamina's move, giving Baihaki no leeway to stray from the nation's interest by favoring foreign parties," Ramses said.

Chairman of the Association of Indonesian Mining Professsionals (Perhapi) Herman Afif Kusumo also criticized the appointment of Baihaki.

He said he did not believe Baihaki would be able to turn Pertamina into a world-class company as expected by Gus Dur.

"Nothing will happen (in Pertamina) as Baihaki's track of records is limited to exploration and production, while Pertamina is a multidimensional company," Herman was quoted by Antara as saying.

He said Pertamina did not only handle exploration and production, but also liquefied natural gas (LNG), petrochemical and refinery business.

"Thus, there is no guarantee that Baihaki will turn Pertamina into a global market player," Herman said. (jsk/prb/bkm)