- HOUSTON (Reuters) - Enron
Corp. ENRNQ.PK , the bankrupt energy trader, on Friday said Jeffrey McMahon,
its president and chief operating officer, will resign on June 1 after
barely four months in those positions in order to make room for new leadership.
-
- The 41-year-old, who joined Enron in 1994, was the highest-ranking
executive remaining since the company collapsed late last year amid an
accounting scandal.
-
- Houston-based Enron said McMahon chose to resign on his
own, and added the company will not fill his positions until Enron "progresses
with the roll-out of the new company." McMahon had been working with
interim Chief Executive Stephen Cooper on a plan to reorganize Enron.
-
- "Making room for new leadership before we announce
the plan for the new company is best for Enron's stakeholders and for me,"
McMahon said in a statement.
-
- An Enron insider, McMahon was named Enron's president
and chief operating officer on Jan. 29. He started his career at Arthur
Andersen & Co., which itself is disintegrating after serving as Enron's
auditor.
-
- McMahon had worked under Andrew Fastow, Enron's former
chief financial officer, as the company's treasurer.
-
- Fastow was ousted in October as CFO and is accused of
spearheading off-balance-sheet partnerships in which Enron hid billions
of dollars of debt. McMahon succeeded Fastow as CFO before assuming his
current positions.
-
- McMahon is said to have openly questioned some of the
partnerships, which contributed to the one-time energy giant filing the
largest bankruptcy in U.S. history last Dec. 2.
-
- A trained accountant known for his political savvy and
strong sales ability, McMahon has held a number of senior roles at Enron,
including executive vice president of finance and treasurer.
-
- A decade ago, McMahon found himself in another major
corporate controversy, as an internal auditor at the U.S. unit of Metallgesellschaft,
MG Corp., which eventually lost more than $1 billion from oil futures trading,
making headlines around the world.
-
- Kenneth Lay, Enron's former chairman and chief executive,
resigned in January. Lay had succeeded Jeffrey Skilling as chief executive
after Skilling resigned that position last August.
|
