Pakistan GasPort Limited (PGL) has reportedly provided misleading information to the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) to get the licence of LNG terminal at Port Qasim Authority (PQA) that would jeopardise LNG Mashal project by using public sector companies network, Business Recorder has learnt.
According to documents submitted to Ogra in a public hearing on Tuesday the applicant (PGL) submitted an undated and unsigned letter issued by Iqbal Z Ahmed to PQA where demands were made (and not confirmed if these were accepted by PQA) which would compromise the LNG Mashal Project.
"It is a mandatory requirement for the Ogra application that the Chief Executive of the applicant company will certify that ''LNG Policy for selecting the site has been met''. The certificate presented in the application states ''LNG Policy will be met'' which shows that applicant has not complied with the condition of LNG policy", documents say.
In a project''s concept report, provided in the application, the owner of the project is shown to be Associated Group. There is no such legal entity as ''Associated Group'' and therefore application suffers from misleading information about ownership. In addition, as the project is totally dependent on infrastructure to be provided by other companies (SSGC/SNGPL), how can the project be approved based only on ''Preliminary discussions'' with these companies, as admitted by the applicant himself, is a question for the relevant approving authorities.
The applicant has stated that he will use the pipelines of public sector entities for gas transmission and distribution and yet it has provided no agreement with these companies or tariff commitment/obligation related thereto. The government of Pakistan has already launched LNG Mashal Project, which is also based on utilisation of pipelines and other infrastructure of SSGC and SNGPL. So PGL proposal to use network of SSGC and SNGPL will jeopardise the Mashal Project. Obviously, Mashal as an SSGC and government of Pakistan project would have higher priority and preference, as opposed to PGL.
In this case, the applicant intends to use the following investments of the state: (i) Channel night lighting cost at Port Qasim running into millions of rupees; (ii) Valuable land at Port Qasim allotted to this company in 2007 within one day of applying for this land on the basis that it will set up the LNG project within 23 months; and (iii) Pipeline infrastructure, invested by SSGC and SNGPL. Despite facilities of the state, there is no transparent pricing mechanism agreed with PGL which will demonstrate that the people of Pakistan will not be exploited in this project.
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