Islamabad: A local newspaper reported that Turkish entity Karkey Karandeniz Eelktrik Uretim As, has been awarded damages worth $700m over the rental power plants (RPPs) in a lawsuit filed against Pakistan in International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID).
The ICSID on August 22nd had placed this notice on its website regarding the awarding of damages to Karkey to the tune of $700m.
According to sources, the tribunal had given a decision in March 2016 but reached to the amount of penalization which converts into Rs74b which Pakistan would be liable to pay.
During the previous PPP administration, Karkey had been awarded a $560m contract for power ship operations to overcome power outages for a period of five years. But, the PML-N led opposition steered by Khawaja Asif and PPP-Patriots leader Faisal Saleh had filed a litigation citing corruption in Supreme Court against the rental power plants scheme.
Sources revealed the awarding of this penalty had been kept under wraps by the incumbent government to avoid embarrassment, as Karkey was also requested to keep silent regarding it.
Ex-NAB prosecutor general KK Agha in 2012-13 had tried to settle the dispute with Karkey, but had been forbidden by then chief justice Iftikhar Chaudhry not to proceed with any settlement with them.
On Tuesday, ex-PM Raja Pervaiz Ashraf and former finance minister Shaukat Tareen were indicted, along with 10 others, in Rental Power Project (RPP) case by an accountability court, a private news channel reported.
Ismail Qureshi and Shahid Rafique, former federal secretaries, have also been indicted with charges of corruption in Sahuwal and Piranghaib rental power projects.
12 RPP cases are already be investigated by NAB for nine RPPs failing to set up plants after receiving more than 22 billion rupees to commission projects by the government.
Rs13 billion have been recovered by NAB in this given regard.
