The government should follow Petronas’ lead inn slashing the salaries of their top executives following the slide in global oil prices, Malay rights pressure group Perkasa said.

The call came after Petronas confirmed a leaked internal memo which stated it aimed to cut capital and operating expenditure by RM50 billion over the next four years in face of plummeting oil prices.

“Perkasa welcomes and congratulates Petronas for announcing that it will cut its expenses by RM50 billion.

“We hope Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak can do the same, lead by example,” Perkasa chief Ibrahim Ali told reporters at the Perkasa headquarters in Kuala Lumpur today.

While Ibrahim claimed that Petronas had pledged to cut the remuneration of its top executives, the Petronas president’s memo sighted by Malaysiakini on Tuesday did not make any reference to this.

In the memo, Petronas president Wan Zulkiflee Wan Ariffin told the oil giant’s staff that the year would be a difficult one and that more details of the restructuring process would be revealed in March.