The sudden resignation, late on Monday, of Hellenic Petroleum’s managing director, Athanassios Karachalios, sparked yet another row between the government and opposition New Democracy, with the former defending Karachalios’s record and the latter accusing him of mismanagement.
Karachalios resigned, as he told reporters, “for personal reasons, primarily related to health.” He had been at his post the past two years. He also made public his resignation letter to Development Minister Akis Tsochadzopoulos, in which he presented what he said were his achievements over the past two years: maintaining relatively low prices in petroleum products, even in the face of crisis, such as the invasion of Iraq; leading the company to record profitability; the successful merger with Petrola, (formerly owned by the Latsis group), which led to large economies of scale and the vast improvement of Hellenic Petroleum’s distribution network; the successful development of the oil trading business;the creation of a successful energy company with the construction of an electricity generating station in Thessaloniki; expansion into shipping; and the upgrading of all refineries “When an enterprise gains market share some one else looses and this inevitably creates grievances” Karachalios told reporters.
After Hellenic Petroleum’s merger with Petrola its single domestic competitor is Motor Oil, half-owned by Saudi Arabia’s ARAMCO, with the rest belonging to the Vardinoyiannis family. Given the close ties of the Vardinoyiannis group with several New Democracy MPs, Karachalios’s reference is an implied answer to his New Democracy critics. One of them, MP George Salagoudis, said that Karachalios’s resignation was good news, because he, as a managing director, led the company to a series of “costly and nontransparent” moves that hurt Hellenic Petroleum. Salagoudis specifically mentioned contractsfor the durchese of crude oil and the $1 billion (under considention) acquisition of Romania’s Petrom as moves that hurt Hellenic Petroleum.
New Democracy spokesman Theodoros Rousopoulos said the resignation raised questions about the ‘real reasons behind (Karachalios’s) removal”. Tsochadzopoulos rallied to Karachalios’s defense, saying accusations of mismanagement were part of the opposition’s “general, scaremongering positions.” Hellenic Petroleum’s chairman Giorgios Moraitis, earlier this week took over as managing director of Greece’s top energy company.
Market sources told energia.gr that regardless of widespread criticism of Karachalios’s style of management, Hellenic Petroleum over the last two years made important inroads into new markets and achieved considerable geographical expansion under his helm. Hellenic Petroleum also improved substantially both thrnover and profits, a fact however which is not reftected in it present stock price.