until Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League
Petronas Yamaha SRT team principal and future WithU RNF Yamaha boss Razlan Razali has been forced to issue an apology to his former title sponsor only days before the SRT squad ceases to exist, after comments made earlier this year in an interview with German publication Speedweek.
Razali has been at the centre of the controversy surrounding the departure of Malaysian oil giant Petronas from the Sepang International Circuit-owned team and the subsequent folding of the squad after three very successful years as Yamaha’s satellite MotoGP team.
He was set to team up with team director Johan Stigefelt in a management buyout of the outfit that would have kept their MotoGP efforts alive for 2022 while folding the Moto2 and Moto3 teams.
That subsequently failed to come to fruition when Razali launched something of a palace coup against the Swede, separating completely from him and forming the RNF Racing brand to take over as Yamaha’s satellite partner on an unusual one-year deal for next year.
Since then, Razali has given a number of controversial interviews to Speedweek, most recently admitting that the decision to sign seven-time MotoGP champion Valentino Rossi for his final season in the premier class was a mistake.
Razali also criticised Petronas’ decision to not continue backing the team for 2022 after initial negotiations about a sponsorship contract fell apart, saying that they never gave him a chance to finalise a new deal.
“I received an offer last June,” he explained. “They wanted to give us less money, of course. I replied that we can’t do it for less money and I asked for a slight increase in the budget back in June. Looking back now, I should have accepted this offer from June …
“I counted on two possibilities: Either they would say ‘there is no other offer. That’s what we pay.’ Or they would continue the negotiations. Instead, they have chosen to withdraw. They did not give us an opportunity to discuss again.”
However, Razali (a former CEO of the Sepang Circuit) also singled out senior members of Petronas staff for individual criticism – an action that seems to have backfired on him today with the issuance of an apology from the team only two weeks before it folds.
“The two women who came in 2018,” he replied when questioned about his relationship with Anita Azrina Abdul Aziz, head of strategic communications at Petronas, “have left Petronas, and the same lady, with whom I sometimes discussed heatedly, has returned – boom! One can ask: was the non-continuation of the sponsorship agreement a coincidence?”
And with Razali still an employee of the Sepang International Circuit until the end of 2021 despite his frequent media apperances lately as head of his new team set to replace them, it seems that he’s been now forced to retract his words as part of his final actions for the SIC-owned team.
“I sincerely regret on the outcome of how the articles were written,” he said in the statement, “and the impact they have received. It was never my intention to create any friction between myself and the parties involved.
“With that, I apologise if the parties mentioned by these journalists are offended in any way. We have mutually agreed that the partnership have reached its purpose and objectives and given the economic situation globally due to the pandemic, I respect the decision made by the title partner to discontinue with the team.
“The team together with its title partner have achieved and accomplished so much in the three years of our collaboration and I thank our partner for the commitment and support given as we concluded on a positive note at the last race in Valencia.”
That was underlined further by an even more brief comment from his replacement as Sepang Circuit CEO, Azhan Shafriman Hanif, whose own words were even more forecful.
“The said articles do not express the views or opinions of SIC as the team owner,” he added, “and neither are shared, supported or endorsed in any manner. We respect Petronas’ decision to conclude the title partnership and stand firmly that the separation was mutual and importantly, amicably agreed. We would like to thank Petronas for their constant support throughout the partnership.”
