Bellew to quit MAS and return to Ryanair

Updated 8 years ago · Published on 17 Oct 2017 6:36PM · 3 Comments

Peter Bellew is quitting Malaysia Airlines Berhad to return to Irish budget airlines Ryanair, where he will be chief operations officer. – The Malaysian Insight file pic, October 17, 2017.

MALAYSIA Airlines Bhd chief executive Peter Bellew will return to Ryanair after helming the ailing national carrier for just over a year, after the first foreign chief executive quit within a year on the job.

The Irish budget airlines today announced that Bellew will return to Ryanair as chief operations officer.

Bellew first joined MAS in 2015 as chief operating officer, and became CEO in July 2016.

The former Ryanair director of flight operations will take up his new post on December 1 and will be responsible for flight and ground operations, engineering, training and career development, the airline said.

As recently as September, Bellew was reported in The Star saying that he would stay put with MAS despite speculation he would return to Ryanair.

He joined MAS on September 1, 2015 as chief operations officer following a restructuring plan by Khazanah Nasional Bhd which saw the retrenchment of 6,000 MAS employees.

Bellew took over from outgoing CEO Christoph Mueller on July 1, 2016 after the latter quit MAS less than a year into his contract citing personal reasons.

Bellew is the third MAS CEO in two years after Mueller and Ahmad Jauhari Yahya, who stepped down after the twin MAS tragedies of MH370 and MH17 in 2014.

Flight MH370, carrying 239 people, was on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014 before disappearing. According to experts, the Boeing 777 plane is believed to have diverted from its flight path and turned back before crashing in the Southern Indian Ocean.

During a regular flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, flight MH17 was shot down on July 17, 2014 while flying over eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board. – October 17, 2017.

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Comments

  • Nice. A stab in the back for the Rakyat. Government should never appoint another Mat Salleh in any GLC. So whos the next CEO in the list? With this new development, is MAS going down the history books? A once world reknown airline going kabush! Sad day for Malaysia.

    Posted 8 years ago by Jimmy Jimmy · Reply

    • MAS is in such dire straits, we must get the best person, irrespective of the colour of his skin. If you want a "local", see below ..... LOL ....

      Posted 8 years ago by Malaysian First · Reply

  • The talibans may insist the next CEO be a Muslim then ....... NO to alcohol ....... NO to shorts,tank tops, etc ....... segregated seating, toilets, cups, cutlerys, etc ....... NO to newspapers or other reading materials, only "the holy book" allowed ..... NO to piped-in music, movies, etc ..... half the seats removed for prayer space ...... etc ...

    Posted 8 years ago by Malaysian First · Reply