ISLAMABAD: The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Wednesday directed Cabinet Secretary Raja Hassan Abbas to initiate an inquiry into the alleged irregular appointment of 20 contract employees to the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) and submit a report within a month.
Syed Khurshid Shah, leader of the opposition in the National Assembly, chaired the PAC meeting and reviewed audit paras of the Cabinet Division for the fiscal year of 2013-14.
At the meeting, the OGRA director general informed the committee that 20 people were appointed to the authority in 2011-12 on a contract basis when there was a ban on recruitments to the authority. Thus, he said, the payment of Rs3.11 million as pay and allowances to these people was declared irregular.
He said that OGRA also released Rs1.3 million to a consultant who was appointed in violation of rules and regulations. On this, the PAC chairman directed the cabinet secretary to submit a report on legal powers of the OGRA to the PAC at the next meeting.
Discussing the audit para pertaining to the transfer of losses to consumers due to the revision of benchmarks for Rs2.8 billion UFG losses, the PAC chairman said the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) should improve its performance instead of transferring the financial burden to consumers. He also summoned the managing directors of the SNGPL and the Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC) to answer questions relating to their performance.
At the meeting, the people in attendance came to know that the OGRA did not pay compensation to the people who were affected by a cylinder explosion in Lahore’s Allama Iqbal Town on May 3, 2005.
He said that Anoud Gas was found responsible for the incident and it was decided that OGRA would pay compensation to the families of the people who were killed in this incident. The OGRA paid just Rs300,000 to the families of the dead and Rs25,000 to the injured and transferred the rest of the money to the company’s account.
OGRA Chairman Saeed Ahmed Khan said the authority had taken measures to distribute the compensation amount to the affected families, but the deputy commissioner did not provide it the succession certificates.
Shah expressed his displeasure at the non-payment of compensation to the affected people and sought a report from the OGRA within three days.
DAILY TIMES
YEMI
0 comments:
Post a Comment