Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi''s claim that all the relevant information with respect to Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) contract between Pakistan and Qatar are available on Pakistan State Oil (PSO) website is not factually accurate.
Enumerating government''s performance in oil and gas sector at a news conference on Wednesday, Prime Minister claimed that people are criticizing the 15-year long term Pak-Qatar LNG deal without reading its contents which have been uploaded on the website of PSO. He further said that some confidential clauses were not made public and that the LNG contract between Pakistan and Qatar was at the lowest cost in the world signed to cope with Pakistan''s energy crisis. It was not shared with parliament or the parliament''s standing committees
Pakistan State Oil uploaded on its website the details of contract but large portions of the 89-page LNG contract are blacked out due to confidentiality clause (25.1) including the contract price, the adjusted annual contract quantity, annual upward flexibility quantity, downward flexibility quantity, annual make good quantity, buyers obligation to take or pay, net proceeds, take or pay or make up LNG by buyer, and payment schedule.
The full content of the Pakistan and Qatar LNG agreement was revealed by Business Recorder on September 25, 2017 however it cannot be a legal document without the government acknowledging that it is identical to the actual agreement.
The Ministry of Petroleum and PSO failed to upload the LNG deal signed on February 8, 2016 till November, 2016 despite repeated commitments by the then Petroleum Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi. Deputy Chairman Senate and former Chairman Senate Standing Committee on Finance Saleem Mandviwalla of Pakistan Peoples'' Party (PPP) said that the government was deliberately not making the deal public which is required under the law. He said there were kickbacks and commissions in LNG deal therefore the Petroleum Ministry refused to discuss it in the Senate Standing Committee on Finance.
On February 13, 2018, the Supreme Court ruled that it did not want to hear cases of a political nature and defined the petition filed by Sheikh Rashid through his counsel Sardar Latif Khosa challenging the LNG agreement signed between Qatargas and Pakistan State Oil as of a political nature. The court observed that National Accountability Bureau (NAB) was an independent institution and able to undertake the necessary investigation to determine whether the substance of the LNG deal preempted any concerns about the possibility of corruption and whether the LNG agreement followed due process.
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