British Petroleum (BP) has announced the retirement of its North Africa Regional President Hesham Mekawi. Following a distinguished with BP spanning over 30 years, Mekawi will leave at the end of 2020 to pursue non-executive director opportunities.
He will continue in his current role until 1 July 2020, and will then spend six months as a senior advisor to ensure the smooth transition of leadership.
Mekawi joined BP in 1990 and, in the early stages of his career, held a variety of commercial, economic analysis and business development roles in Cairo, Houston, Chicago and London. He led the consolidation of BP Egypt, BP Algeria and BP Libya, to create the expanded BP North Africa Region in 2014..
He transformed the company’s North Africa business by identifying and progressing complex growth opportunities and actively managing the portfolio. Over the past five years, BP has invested $14bn in Egypt, delivering at its peak 60% of Egypt’s annual gas production together with its partners.
Mekawi has been recognised many times over the years, both internally and externally. Of particular note, he and his team were awarded BP’s Helios award for “BP at its best”, in 2011.
“I have always been driven by three passions: a passion to achieve outstanding results, a passion to develop people and a passion to contribute towards the communities in which we operate,” Mekawi said. “I firmly believe that they go hand-in-hand, and success in one leads to success in the others. Working for BP has been a privilege and I am immensely proud of what has been achieved during my career.”
BP’s CEO, Bernard Looney, added, “Over the years, BP has counted on Hesham’s vision and leadership to maintain and grow our business in North Africa. Hesham has always shown outstanding performance and progressive leadership supported by longstanding relationships with key stakeholders and business partners. His deep commitment to the development of people has served as an example to us all. Hesham has been instrumental in delivering on our plans over many years, regardless of the circumstances. We will miss him.”
