Second Dutch casualty from Shell shake-up

Another senior Dutch executive of Shell is quitting the oil giant early following the appointment of Phil Watts as chairman in July last year.

The Anglo-Dutch group announced yesterday that Harry Roels, a group managing director and one of the five top executives who run the company, is resigning for "personal reasons".

Mr Roels will leave his £630,000-a-year job at the end of June – six years before his official retirement date.

A statement from Shell quoted Mr Watts and the group's vice-chairman, Jeroen van der Veer, as saying: "Harry has contributed more than 30 years of valuable service. We respect his decision and wish him well."

Shell declined to elaborate further, prompting speculation in the markets that Mr Roels was leaving after being passed over for the top job.

Mr Roels is the second senior Dutch executive to quit since the announcement in December 2000 that Mr Watts, a Leicester-born physicist, would replace Sir Mark Moody-Stewart as Shell's chairman. The following February Maarten Van den Bergh, president of Royal Dutch Petroleum Company, resigned.

The appointment of Mr Watts in effect ended any hopes Mr Roels might have had of becoming chairman. By the time Mr Watts retires in four years, Mr Roels would have been too close to retirement age to be a candidate for the chairmanship.

Traditionally, the chairman's job at the Royal Dutch/Shell Group alternates between a Briton and a Dutchman but Mr Watts's appointment bucked that arrangement.

Shell has broken with tradition in other ways since Mr Watts took over – appointing its first-ever female finance director, Judy Boynton, who also came from outside the company and the oil industry.

In addition to being managing director of Royal Dutch, Mr Roels is also responsible for the group's gas and power divisions, its operations in Australasia and East Asia and its e-business and IT activities.

A replacement for Mr Roels has not yet been announced although Shell is expected to name a new managing director for the group and for Royal Dutch by the time of its fourth-quarter financial results in February.