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The parliamentary panel on Friday summoned Chairman National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for not filing references against former law minister and top officials accused of involvement in Nandipur power plant scam that led to Rs 113 billion loss to the national exchequer. The sub-body of the Senate Standing Committee on Water and Power chaired by Senator Nauman Wazir also summoned former Law Minister Dr Babar Awan and former secretaries Law and Water and Power.

Finance Ministry had issued sovereign guarantees to secure foreign lending to implement the Nandipur power project subject to clearance from Law Ministry. However Law Ministry did not clear it even after the passage of over one and half years that led to cessation of work on the project.

State Minister for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali said that Khawaja Asif had filed a petition in the Supreme Court regarding this project and judicial commission held Law Ministry responsible for mishandling of the project. He said that Dr Babar Awan was the then Law Minister and due to his negligence the project had come to a halt. Shipment of equipment began arriving in January 2009 and the process was halted in April 2010. Officials said that 50 percent machinery had arrived and syndicated banks began withholding bills of lading after April 2010; 50 percent machinery was on site: 33percent at Karachi port and the remaining 13 percent was at a China port.

Power Ministry officials said that in 2013 a case was sent to NAB to file a reference following findings of judicial commission. Abid Sher Ali said that Khawaja Asif had met NAB Chairman and urged him to pursue the case. Several letters were also written to NAB regarding this case. "We want to arrest all accused in this case," he said.

Chairman sub-committee said that PML-N, ANP and PTI were on the same page on the matter and will pursue it. "We will register an FIR," he said and added that it has been decided to summon NAB chairman, former Law Minister Babar Awan, former Secretary Water and Power and Law.

The sub-body observed that Nepra failed in its duty and raised questions on the different yardsticks used in the public and private sector as well as standards Nepra followed in undertaking performance and liability tests of private and public sector projects. It was revealed that an amount of Rs 33 billion had been spent on the project up to June 2013 which prompted the decision not to abandon the project. The revised PC-1 estimated a cost of Rs 58.4 billion with an increase in the electricity generation cost from 52 million dollars per MW to 111 million dollars per MW. The sub-body directed that the cost be verified from a chartered accountant firm.

A Nepra official said that Nandipur capacity utilisation was 75 percent against IPPs'' 88 percent. A Power Ministry official said that Nepra allowed 75 percent capacity utilisation. The Chairman Board of Directors stated that Nandipur was not originally designed on gas while the Power Ministry official pointed out that at the time gas was not available to Punjab as there was no allocation of gas by Petroleum Ministry. Punjab does not have gas resources however with LNG now being imported Nandipur is being converted to imported gas. The power plant will be run cheaply and efficiently on gas, it was pointed out. However, it was acknowledged that the plant was shut down due to unforeseen situation and forced schedule.

Chairman committee asked why Nandipur plant was till not being run and he was informed that project employees were from Wapda and had refused to run the plant. At present, the contract to hire manpower as an interim arrangement to operate the plant is with a local private firm. Chairman committee expressed his reservations against Nepra for not conducting an audit of the heat rate of IPPs to determine the generation cost. The officials of Power Ministry supported the Chairman''s call.



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