Shareholders of IRPC, formerly known as Thailand Petrochemical Industry (TPI), yesterday voted to sack eight directors, including three members of the Leophairatana family, in a move seen as an attempt to get rid of those connected with TPI founder Prachai Leophairatana.

The meeting of 2,191 IRPC shareholders voted unanimously to sack Prateep, Pramuan and Malinee Leophairatana before their terms ended on grounds that they are not qualified to be company directors.

The Securities and Exchange Commission had earlier filed charges of misconduct against the three directors. If they remained in their positions, the company would find it difficult to secure loans in future, chief executive Piti Yimprasert said.

Pramuan and Prateep's terms on the board of directors were set to end in April. Malinee's term was to end next year.

The other five directors were removed for being frequently absent from meetings. They are Kamol Iamsakulrat, Tayuth Sriyuksiri, Tavich Taychanavakul, Chainarong Taypaisithpong and Chaiwat Taepaisithpong.

They were all appointed while Prachai was at the helm of TPI and their removal is seen as an attempt by IPRC's management to operate the company more efficiently. For instance, the five directors rarely turned up for board meetings to discuss the company's rehabilitation plan last year.

Chainarong and Chaiwat had already submitted their resignations to the board earlier this month.

Piti said that the extraordinary shareholders' meeting had also agreed to revise the company's plan to refinance its debt of US$800 million (Bt28.7 billion) through foreign borrowings because of the Bank of Thailand's 30-per-cent withholding requirement on capital inflows.

Piti said the central bank had refused his request for a waiver, so the company would have to consider other options such as issuing domestic bonds in March to refinance half of the debt, which falls due in September. The other half of the debt is long-term debt with a repayment period of six to seven years.

"We are trying to find foreign financial institutions to support our fund-raising plan, but it is difficult in the current circumstances," he said.

Piti said the company had asked credit-rating agencies to rate the company's borrowing status and had found that IRPC has the capacity to raise between Bt6 billion and Bt13 billion.

IRPC shareholders also approved buying the debt of Rayong Tank Terminal from West LBAG of Singapore. Rayong Tank Terminal has debt worth $13.5 million, which IRPC agreed to buy for $12.8 million. IPRC will become sole owner of Rayong Tank Terminal through the debt purchase.

Piti said that the IPRC planned to utilise Rayong Tank Terminal's storage capacity of 1.5 billion litres, otherwise the company would have to construct its own oil tanks at a cost of about Bt30 billion.

Piti said the company's performance in the first quarter this year should improve from last year due to more stable oil prices. At present, the company has oil stock of 2.4 million barrels.

Besides removing the directors, IPRC shareholders also agreed to amend the clause relating to the number of directors in its article of association to stipulate that the number of directors should be not less than five and not more than 17.

IPRC has 16 directors after the restructuring of the board yesterday.

In the first nine months of last year, IRPC recorded total sales of Bt166.23 billion and a net profit Bt9.10 billion.

Chalida Ekvitthayavechnukul

The Nation