The president of Sinopec Corp, China's second largest oil and gas producer, announced his retirement over the weekend, abiding by the government's age-ceiling for executives of state-owned companies.

However, Sinopec, which is listed in Hong Kong, New York, London and Shanghai, said Wang Jiming, 62, will remain vice-chairman of the board of directors, according to Xinhua News Agency.

The company has appointed 43-year-old Wang Tianpu, a senior vice-president, to replace Wang and steer Asia's largest refiner.

"This is a normal leadership reshuffle. It's just a case of younger people succeeding senior ones," said Chen Tonghai, chairman of Sinopec Group, which holds the controlling stake in Sinopec Corp.

Sinopec's change in management comes after the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) adopted a hard-line last December to force more than 50 large state-owned enterprises to abide by the government's age policy.

SASAC requires presidents of companies equivalent to ministry level to leave their positions, should they are more than 65 years old. The age ceiling is 60 for a vice-ministry-level company, of which Sinopec is one.

In recent months, Sinopec's peers, such as China Telecom, China Unicom and China National Cereals, Oil and Foodstuffs, have all announced the retirement of their presidents.

Sinopec said its new president, Wang Tianpu, is "a professor level senior engineer and well-experienced in the production and management of the petrochemical industry."

(China Daily March 28, 2005)