Pertamina hopes to complete liquidation of Petral mid this year

State-owned oil and gas firm PT Pertamina expects said that the liquidation process of its trading arm Petral Group and subsidiary Zembesi is expected to be completed in the middle of this year.

Pertamina President Director Dwi Soetjipto said in a statement Monday that the formal liquidation process of the Petral Group started in February of this year. ?Following tax clearance from tax authority in Hong Kong, Zembesi and Petral will be dissolved, and we projected this will be completed in the middle of this year,? Dwi said in the statement.

He added that another Petral subsidiary, Pertamina Energy Services Pte Ltd, will be dissolved once it has settled its debt obligations.

Pertamina has decided to dissolve Petral, which handled the country?s import of fuel and crude, following findings of graft practices and massive inefficiency. The import activities have now been taken over by Pertamina?s Integrated Supply Chain (ISC).

Dwi said in the statement that the transformation processes and efficiency measures taken by ISC are expected to provide value added and efficiency gains worth about US$656 million per year for the company in the future.

Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak