Lawyer Al-Ammari Retires
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Author: Stephen L. Brundage (Saudi Aramco News)
Released 13 July 2009
DHAHRAN, July 08, 2009 -- General attorney Saud Al-Ammari — one of Saudi Aramco’s first Saudi lawyers — bade farewell to colleagues June 17 at ad-Diwan, ending a 27-year career with the company.
Al-Ammari spoke of his first day with the company in 1982, when he told Saleh Al-Jibali of the Employment Department that he wanted to work for the Law organization and he wanted the company to sponsor his legal studies.
Stan E. McGinley, right, congratulates Saud Al-Ammari on a fruitful career. (Photo: Hasan M. Al-Taraiki)“Saleh looked at me, and I could tell from his facial expression that he was thinking ‘who does this guy think he is?’ Well, that was exactly what happened,” Al-Ammari said.
Al-Ammari first earned his undergraduate degree from American University in Washington, D.C., before joining the company.
“He then became the first Saudi employee to be selected as a worthy candidate for sponsorship by the company for a legal education,” Stan E. McGinley, Saudi Aramco’s general counsel, told the audience.
“He fulfilled all our expectations and hopes in overcoming the many hurdles to becoming a law graduate in the U.S., and thereafter taking and passing the bar exam. He was awarded his juris doctor degree from South Texas College of Law in 1986, and then took and passed the Pennsylvania bar.”
In 1989, Al-Ammari returned to the United States, where he earned a master-of-law degree from Harvard Law School. From 1995-2003, Al-Ammari served in the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources in Riyadh, where he served first as legal counsel for a year and later as the Ministry’s general counsel.
McGinley noted that after concluding the Ministry assignment Al-Ammari returned to Dhahran, but he didn’t stay for long. “In 2006, his unique talents were again called upon by the Government,” and Al-Ammari was loaned to the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia in London, where he managed and resolved sovereign cases in the English courts.
Al-Ammari and his wife are building a house in Dhahran, which they plan to make home base. He credited early participation in the company Savings Plan with enabling the couple to build their dream house and gave recognition to his late father, attorney Abdullah M. Al-Ammari, and his mother for their guidance and inspiration throughout his life. He also noted the joy that his children have brought him.
He also spoke of another mother — Mother Aramco — and the difference the company made in his life.
“I will never be able to say it enough: I am truly indebted to our compassionate mother, Saudi Aramco, who took care of me when I was young, continued to look after me and my family as a growing professional and will continue to look after me, even after I leave,” Al-Ammari told his colleagues and friends. “To this great mother I can only say: I promise to be a good son.”
(Article by Stephen L. Brundage)