The Addax Petroleum Management Team - Biographies
« back to the Senior Management main page
Jean Claude Gandur, President, Chief Executive Officer and Director
Mr. Gandur is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Addax Petroleum Corporation. Mr. Gandur has worked with major commodity traders including Philipp Brothers from 1976 to 1983, where he was Manager of the African/Latin American division; Sigmoil Resources N.V. from 1984 to 1986, where he was the Managing Director; and Kaines SA from 1986 to 1988, where he was the Managing Director. For ten years Mr. Gandur was honorary consul for the Republic of Congo in Geneva. Mr. Gandur was also awarded a diplomatic passport by Senegal. In addition, he has received the decorations of Grand Officer of the Lion Order of Senegal and Commander of the National Order of Benin. Mr. Gandur is one of the founders of AOG, of which he is Chairman of the Supervisory Board. Mr. Gandur is also the Non-Executive Chairman of AXMIN Inc. Mr. Gandur is a Swiss citizen and studied law at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland.
James Pearce, Chief Operating Officer
Mr. Pearce is the Chief Operating Officer of Addax Petroleum Corporation. Mr. Pearce is responsible for all of Addax Petroleum’s upstream activities including new ventures, exploration, new fields development and operations in West Africa and the Middle East. Mr. Pearce joined Addax Petroleum in May, 2005 after 30 years with various Chevron subsidiaries. He has held many positions with Chevron including Chief Engineer in Sumatra Indonesia, Manager, Petroleum Engineering in Lagos, Nigeria, General Manager, Asset Development in Luanda, Angola, Managing Director in the Republic of Congo, and most recently General Manager, Deepwater in Lagos, Nigeria. In his most recent assignment with Chevron he was responsible for all deep-water operations in Nigeria including the multi-billion dollar development of the giant Agbami field.
Mr. Pearce holds a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology and has received two US Patents for innovative drilling platform concepts for arctic operations. Mr. Pearce is a Member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers and was past Chairman of the Lagos Chapter. He has published in both international and American journals and has made numerous technical presentations at major conferences.
Michael Ebsary, Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Ebsary is the Chief Financial Officer of Addax Petroleum Corporation. Mr. Ebsary worked at the Bank of Nova Scotia from 1986 to 1987 and the Bank of Montreal from 1987 to 1989, prior to joining the international upstream oil business with Occidental in London in 1989. Following the acquisition of Occidental’s U.K. assets by Elf, Mr. Ebsary was appointed Treasurer of Elf Petroleum UK in 1991. In 1994, Mr. Ebsary was transferred to Elf’s head office in Paris to the role of Senior Manager, Project Finance, during which time his responsibilities included major project financings in emerging markets, particularly in Nigeria, Chad and Cameroon. Mr. Ebsary joined the Corporation in 1998 and became Chief Financial Officer in 1999. Mr. Ebsary is a citizen of both Canada and the United Kingdom and studied mathematics and statistics, followed by an MBA in finance and accounting, at Queen’s University in Kingston, Canada.
David Codd, Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary
Mr. Codd is the Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary of Addax Petroleum Corporation. Mr. Codd has over 25 years experience in the international oil industry. After qualifying with a major UK law firm, Mr Codd worked from 1980 to 1984 for Burmah Oil. In 1984 he joined Britoil Plc as Senior Legal Adviser. Following two years with ConocoPhillips in the UK, in 1990 he was appointed General Counsel to Texaco’s integrated operations in the UK. From 1999 to 2001 Mr. Codd was Managing Director of Texaco in the UK, being Texaco’s senior corporate representative in the UK with business responsibility for Texaco’s regional upstream Business Development. Following Texaco’s merger with Chevron, Mr. Codd was Chairman of a start up company engaged in project development work in the Middle East until he joined the Corporation in February 2005. Mr. Codd is a member of Council of the Energy Institute in the UK and a Trustee of the Energy, Petroleum, Mineral and Natural Resources Education Trust. Mr. Codd is a citizen of the United Kingdom and is a solicitor with an MA (Jurisprudence) and a BCL both from Oxford University.