PPP demands to make public vital information

Islamabad July 27, 2013: PPP has reiterated its call for making public details of payments of Rs 480 billion made to settle the circular debt saying that information merely about the amount paid to each power

producer was meaningless unless it is also accompanied with critical

information about the oil supplied, the power produced and the

capacity utilized by each power producer.

Following public criticism the Finance Ministry announced on July 23 that “details of payments of Rs. 480 billion to settle the circular debt of Rs. 503 billion are now available on the official site of the ministry”.

“The figures of payments made to each producer do not allay suspicion that billions have been paid to power producers against electricity that was never produced and to oil suppliers against shipments that were never made”, said Senator Farhatullah Babar in a statement issued

from the Party’s media office today

Doubts linger because payments have been made to the private power producers and other entities in the energy sector without carrying out third party pre-audit by independent technical and professional

accounting bodies, he said and demanded that all facts be laid bare.

The reports of over 50 billion rupees of unjustified overpayments together with the reports of internal differences of opinion within the Finance Ministry are disturbing that calls for a thorough probe, he said.

He also referred to the claim that the electric power company Pepco

provided reconciled accounts to the water and power ministry which then forwarded it to the finance ministry apparently to allay suspicions of any underhand deal.

He said that even if this procedure had been adopted it was a faulty

procedure without carrying out independent financial and technical audit.

Allowing the private producers of electricity and the powerpurchaser

to sit together behind closed doors and decide among them an issue for which the price is ultimately paid by the general public looks like ‘muk-muka’. An ordinary citizen should not be blamed if he sees in it an underhand deal between vested interests at public expense, he said.

He said that according to media reports the Asian Development Bank insisted and succeeded in making the audit of payments to power producers as part of the recent agreement with the IMF. If these reports are correct it is all the more necessary that the circular debt payments are subjected to a comprehensive third party audit by professional financial and technical auditors, he said.

He said that the 18th Amendment had specifically inserted Article 19-A in the Constitution that states that every citizen shall have the right to have access to information in all matters of public

importance. Complete information pertaining to the payments made to private power producers is a matter great public importance and must be made public. Doubts will linger as long as there is secrecy surrounding it, he said.

Farhatullah Babar said that reports about the banks keeping open on

the last Saturday of June despite weekly holiday in order to make the payments before the close of the last financial year on June 30 also raised questions.

He said that some power producers were also the unofficial advisors on energy who were interested only in the payment of unpaid bills instead of structural reforms.

The government has not been able to address critical issues involving

the gap between the cost power generation and sale, losses due to

theft and in transmission and distribution as is evident from its

inability to evolve consensus in the meeting of the Council of Common Interest (CCI) Tuesday.

As a result the circular debt will re-emerge to haunt the nation of

180 million people even as a few would have made hay as the sun shone brightly over their heads, he said.

PPP asks government to come clean on IPP payments

Claims of transparency will not be credible without making public relevant information

Islamabad July 22, 2013: The Pakistan Peoples Party has challenged the Finance Minister to come out clean on details of payments to the IPPs while disbursing the 322 billion rupees to them towards clearing the circular debt and make public the website on which this information is claimed to have been uploaded.

The Finance Minister in an interview published in local daily Monday claimed that payments to IPPs had been made transparently and the details had been placed on the web.

In a statement today from the Party’s Media Office Senator Farhatullah Babar said that a search of the web sites of Ministries of Finance and Water and Power and also of WAPDA and OGRA revealed that no such details had been placed. If the information is not placed on the website of the related ministries and departments, then where has it been placed, he asked adding “this has raised legitimate questions of transparency and accountability”.

He said that the information available on the web site of Finance Ministry about a July 2 meeting simply says that the ECC was informed that a sum of Rs.322 billion has been paid to the IPPs. It is a bare statement of fact known to every one he said. What was needed to be disclosed but has not been made public are the details about the power produced by each IPP, the time during which it was produced, the rate at which it was paid and the total amount paid to each power producer.

A detailed technical audit of the IPPs was an essential pre-requisite but no such audit was actually carried out before doling out billions to power producers, he said. Who knows if a game of favorites had been played out in the week during which hundreds of billions were paid out, Farhatullah Babar asked.

He said that in order to create an impression of transparency and accountability the web site of the Finance Ministry claims that the IPPs signed MOU pledging to fulfill certain conditions before payments were made to them. However, on closer scrutiny it becomes obvious that it is no more than a false impression.

The first condition which the IPPs are said to have agreed to, he said, is that all the thermal power plants exceeding 2000 MW capacity will be converted into coal fired plants.

It amounts to hood winking the people as there is hardly any thermal IPP of more than 2000 MW capacity. What is flaunted as a great achievement is in fact a ruse to create and sustain false hopes that plants using more expensive fuel are being remodeled so as to run on widely available cheap fuel of coal, he said. Seldom before a plain ruse had been so plainly advertised as a great achievement, he said.

The second condition claimed to have been agreed by the private power producers, according to the web site, is that they will optimally utilize the available plant capacities. However, in the absence of technical audit giving complete information about a plant’s available capacity, the optimal capacity that is desired to be achieved and the time frame within which it is to be achieved it is no more that a vague promise and a false hope he said. What legal force an open ended MoU has to make private producers achieve optimal capacities, or what penalties have been imposed in case they failed to do so, he asked.

A third condition claimed to have been agreed by the private producers is a one month extension allowed by them to PEPCO to make payments. This measure will only give a breather of one more month but will not address the issue of spiraling debt itself which will resurface again as long as the huge difference between the cost of power production and the price at which is sold persists, he said.

Senator Farhatullah Babar said that there is total absence of transparency and a veil of secrecy seems to have been woven around the payments of 322 billion rupees made to the private producers.

Doubts will linger and questions will continue to be asked until the shroud of secrecy is shredded and all relevant information uploaded on the web and the nation informed about where it is available, he said.

this is islamabad,federal capital of pakistan/ beautiful seen of margalla hills

Year 2014 to be commemorated as Year of “Cyber Secure Pakistan”

Islamabad (July 19, 2013): Under the chairmanship of Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed, Chairman Senate Committee on Defence and Defence Production, first meeting of Cyber Security Task Force was held in Parliament House, Islamabad in which senior representatives of relevant public and private sector organizations, parliamentarians, government ministries, academia and media persons participated.


Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed, in his speech, emphasized that the internet is global by default and we need to remain a responsible nation while using it. “Cyber security is, no doubt, a shared responsibility of every one of us and needs close partnership between Government, public/private sector, law-enforcement agencies, academia and international stakeholders so that people can go online with confidence.” The senator said.

Ammar Jaffri, Chairman Cyber Security Task Force informed that Cybercriminals are becoming more skilled – both at penetrating organizations and at avoiding detection by law enforcement agencies. No single organization can make the cyberspace secure and we all need to join hands together for a Cyber Secure Pakistan.

The task force took the following decisions:
Prepare Cyber Security Act-2013 for presentation in the Senate around 14th August, 2013.
Prepare Cyber Security Policy followed by the Cyber Security strategy of Pakistan by 31st Dec, 2013.
Establishing the National Computer Emergency Response Team (PK-CERT) with the coordination of relevant organization and PISA.
Arrange Country-wide awareness campaign on Cyber Security and all kinds of Cyber Security threats in coalition with PISA and all relevant Private and Public sector organizations.
Commemorating the year 2014 as year of “Cyber Secure Pakistan”.
Given the urgency of cyber threats, Senate of Pakistan, in its budget session held on June 2013, unanimously approved for the formation of Cyber Security Task Force, to initiate required steps for Cyber secure Pakistan and then work as force multiplier for the implementation of these initiatives by related public and private sector organizations. Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed, Chairman Senate Committee on Defence and Defence Production, announced the formation of Cyber Security Task Force having representatives , from relevant public and private sector organizations headed by Ammar Jaffri, Former Additional Director General FIA and pioneering head of National Response Centre for Cyber Crimes(NR3C) FIA.

Pak-China Economic Corridor as future of the world

Prime Minister terms Pak-China Economic Corridor as future of the world; gives approval for restructuring of Ministry of Panning and Development

July 18, 2013

Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif has said Pakistan-China Economic Corridor will open up the underdeveloped areas of the country to a new era of economic development and prosperity by connecting maximum number of population through network of highways and railways.
The Prime Minister expressed these views while taking briefing from the officials of Ministries of Planning, Communications and Railways at Pakistan Secretariat this afternoon.

Terming the Pak-China Economic Corridor as the future of the world, the Prime Minister said that 3 Billion people, which is almost half of the world’s population, from China,  South Asia, Central Asia can benefit from this economic corridor and added that it should be so designed that maximum number of people of the country benefit from this corridor.

During the meeting, the Prime Minister was briefed at length about the proposed alignments and lines from Khunjrab to Gwadar that are to be constructed as part of Pakistan-China Economic Corridor. Putting great emphasis on ensuring quality of work and transparency, the Prime Minister directed the concerned authorities to explore more options keeping in view the factors of terrain, population and social cost of the project in the form of population dislocations while drawing the areas through which this Corridor will be passing.

The Prime Minister said that Lahore-Islamabad Motorway should be taken as a model and that its quality and standard need to be kept in view while constructing the Pak-China Economic Corridor.

Taking strong exception of the poor condition of motorways and roads in the country, the Prime Minister said that motorways, highways and road networks are national assets and their repair and maintenance must be given the top most priority.

The Prime Minister said that we should have constructed many more Motorways uptil now but lamented the fact that development of roads and motorways have been the low priority area in the country.

The Prime Minister lamented the fact that projects have never been completed on time and not completing them on time has almost become a national character. “Without setting our priorities right and without moving in the right direction, we can not attain the goal that we have in our mind for the people of Pakistan”, said the Prime Minister.

Expressing his dissatisfaction over the briefing, the Prime Minister gave one week to the Ministry of Communications to complete their work and ordered to arrange a follow-up briefing after that.

The Prime Minister directed Ministries of Communications, Railways and Planning to keep their home work up-to-date to take the process of cooperation with China on Pak-China Economic Corridor to next level of implementation.

The Prime Minister also gave his approval in principle for the restructuring of Planning and Development Division. Under the restructuring plan, the Planning Division will get the status of a think tank for highest policy in-put and the Ministry of Planning and Development will be renamed as Planning, Development and Reforms Division.

Minister for Finance Mr. Muhammad Ishaq Dar, Minister for Information Mr. Pervez Rashid, Minister for Planning and Development Mr. Ahsen Iqbal, Minister for Railways Khawaja Saad Rafiq, Special assistant to the PM Mr. Tariq Fatimi and senior officials of the Ministries of Planning, Railways and Communications attended the briefing.

Senate Defence Committee demands government to make Abbottabad Commission report public,

 act on its recommendations

Islamabad, July 17, 2013:  The Senate Committee on Defence & Defence Production, at its meeting held in Islamabad today, decided to demand that the government make public in a formal and official manner the contents of the Abbottabad Commission report, and place it before the parliament for debate and discussion.  This decision was taken after the Committee met under its Chairman, Senator Mushahid Hussain, at Parliament House today.  The Committee also stated that the report should be made public in toto “including the 40-page Note of Dissent prepared by one of the commission members, Ambassador Ashraf Jehangir Qazi.”

Taking note of the Abbottabad Commission report, the Committee decided to hold a Public Hearing on “Intelligence Reform and Re-organization” soon after Eid and Senator Mushahid Hussain informed the media at a press talk after the Committee meeting that the Senate Defence and Defence Production Committee would prepare its own recommendations regarding national security and counter terror strategy after thorough deliberation of the contents of the report by the Commission.

The Committee also stated in categorical terms that in the context of the Abbottabad Commission report, there should not be any blame game or figure pointing targeting individuals or institutions rather, the endeavor should be to examine the causes of what the Commission has called was a “collective failure” and to ensure that wrongs are reversed so that such failures do not recur.

On the suggestion of Senator Sehar Kamran, the Senate Committee on Defence & Defence Production passed a resolution lauding the role of female paratroopers in the Pakistan armed forces and termed this as a “positive step forward in promoting gender equality within the armed forces and good for nation building, since women will now be playing an active role, shoulder to shoulder, with the men in defending the motherland”.

The Senate Defence and Defence Production Committee also expressed its concern over the induction of a controversial individual as the Head of the newly created Aviation Division since that person’s credentials as a citizen of Pakistan have been questioned by such a high forum like the Supreme Court of Pakistan.  Taking up the issue after media reports in this regard, the Senate Defence Committee also expressed its disquiet over allegations of a conflict of interest involved in creating the Aviation Division after its separation from the Ministry of Defence.  The concern will be addressed through the Ministry of Defence and conveyed to the Prime Minister since he also happens to be the Defence Minister.

annoyed nationalist leader,Sardar Akhtar Mengal called on Prime Minister

  Islamabad: July 12, 2013

Sardar Akhtar Mengal, Chief of Balochistan National Party- Mengal (BNP-M), called on Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif at the Prime Minister’s House this morning.

The Prime Minister expressed the hope that the reinvigoration of democratic process in Balochistan would be instrumental in removing the sense of deprivation and alienation among people of Balochistan.
The Prime Minister reiterated the resolve of his government to bring Balochistan into the national mainstream by restoring peace and stability in the province.

The Prime Minister underlined the need to empower the people of Balochistan through the introduction of political and economic reforms and by initiating public welfare projects for their uplift and progress.

Mr. Mengal appreciated the Prime Minister for his political sagacity and taking all political forces along as this was important for addressing the challenges Pakistan is facing.