The former Managing Director of Pakistan LNG Limited (PLL), Adnan Gilani, and its Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Nadeem Nazir, have been declared guilty of being involved in a multi-million dollar scam of excess payments to LNG suppliers.
A national daily reported that the officials have been charged for excess payments amounting to $27.526 million in the head of port charges.
A four-member committee headed by the Senior Joint Secretary, Sajid Mehmood Qazi, had submitted a 31-page inquiry to the Ministry of Energy (Petroleum Division) on 15 January 2021 detailing these findings.
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The MD and CFO have been declared guilty of gross willful negligence and failure to protect the interests of the 100 percent government-owned company, and also of giving preferential treatment to the Singapore-based Gunvor and the Italian company ENI viz-a-viz other LNG suppliers. The inquiry report revealed that $27.526 million had been overpaid to the LNG suppliers, of which over $22.3834 million had been paid to Gunvor and ENI, which is 80 percent of the total excess payments.
The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) have recommended initiating proceedings and appropriate action against the MD and CFO. The Inquiry Committee believes that they had overstepped their powers and had not obtained the board’s approval for the continued over-payment to all the suppliers.
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The report said that the top management of Pakistan LNG Limited was fully aware by October 2018 that excess amounts were being paid to LNG suppliers.
To augment the argument that the officials had paid excess amounts, the new management of PLL had saved an additional amount of $4,385,145 for the cargoes delivered between October 2020 and January 2021 by taking the correct stance to strictly make payments as per the contract.
