On the Go at CITGO

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HOUSTON -- CITGO Petroleum Corp. has appointed Frank Gygax as chief operating officer effective April 1. Gygax replaces Jerry Thompson, who has retired. Thompson, a 35-year veteran of the company, served as COO since 2003.

Jerry Thompson's contributions to CITGO and the energy industry are remarkable, said CITGO president and CEO F alix Rodr a guez. His efforts and leadership through the years have been widely recognized by his professional peers. We also welcome Frank Gygax to his new position and look forward to benefiting from the wealth of [image-nocss] experience that he and his team members bring to their new roles.

Several other internal promotions also were announced: vice president of the Lake Charles Manufacturing Complex Al Prebula has been named vice president of refining, replacing Gygax; vice president and general manager of the Corpus Christi Refinery Randy Carbo has been named vice president of the Lake Charles Manufacturing Complex, replacing Prebula; and general manager of operations and maintenance at the Corpus Christi Refinery Eduardo Asseff will replace Carbo as vice president and general manager of the Corpus Christi Refinery.

Also, vice president of supply and distribution Bill Hatch assumes additional responsibility as vice president of supply and marketing.

In his most recent role as vice president of refining, Gygax was responsible for integrating and optimizing the PDVSA (parent company Petr aleos de Venezuela, S.A.) and CITGO refining systems. Gygax has more than 30 years of experience in the refining industry. Prior to joining CITGO, he served as president of SINCOR, a joint venture between PDVSA, TotalFinaElf and Statoil. He also served as general manager of PDVSA's Paraguan a refining complex.

Prebula joined CITGO in 1992 as general manager of technical services at the Corpus Christi Refinery. He was named vice president of the Corpus Christi Refinery in March of 1996 and continued in that role until 1999 when he became vice president of the Lake Charles Manufacturing Complex. Prior to joining CITGO, Prebula was employed with Exxon for 24 years, where he held various management positions, including Bayonne, N.J., plant manager.

Carbo joined CITGO in 1976 as a process engineer at the Lake Charles Manufacturing Complex. He held several supervisory and managerial assignments at Lake Charles and at CITGO's former Tulsa headquarters, including operations area manager (Lake Charles) and general manager of lubricants operations (headquarters). He later served as general manager of operations and maintenance at Corpus Christi, as well as general manager of engineering and technical services at Lake Charles before becoming vice president and general manager of the Corpus Christi Refinery in 2004.

Asseff transferred to CITGO from PDVSA in April 1999. At PDVSA, Asseff held several positions of increasing responsibility in the project, process engineering, maintenance and operations areas since 1985 before his transfer to the Corpus Christi Refinery, where he has held positions in both engineering and operations.

Hatch joined CITGO in 1975, beginning his career at the Lake Charles refinery as a process engineer and then advanced through several technical and operations supervisory and management positions. Hatch became vice president supply and distribution in September 2004.

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