ISLAMABAD: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) Anti-Corruption Circle Lahore has initiated an enquiry against the officials of Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) over alleged corruption in the laying of a 260-kilometre-long gas pipeline project. Inside sources said that an internal audit of the company has revealed mega corruption in the construction of parliamentarians lounge on the seventh floor of SNGPL Headquarter.
Sources added that MD SNGPL Ali Javed Hamdani spent a heavy amount on the construction and decoration of the lounge, along with expenditure on vehicles and consumption of large quantities of fuel through these vehicles. However, further scrutiny of the documents is still under process, they revealed.
According to documents available, managing director (MD) SNGPL advised for the construction of visitor’s/parliamentarian lounge during the 197th management committee meeting held on July 1, 2021. Accordingly, the management sanctioned Rs 7.58 million (excluding GST) on July 7, 2021. Work order of Rs 8.6 million was issued to the successful bidder the very next day. However, the tender was floated on 18-08-2021 (49 days before the management sanction) in clear violation of company’s policies and procedure, read more details in the document.
The MD Secretariat, has charged Rs five million (67% of the total civil work). This was charged in violation of the company’s policies and procedures.
It is pertinent to mention that the expenditure charged included new tiles, glass doors, windows, false ceiling, wooden flooring etc which were clearly of capital nature, detailed the document.
Documents available with Profit also disclosed that seven vehicles (excluding the one given to him officially) along with drivers (five permanent and two casual) remained under the use of the MD Secretariat. Previously, three vehicles had been allocated to him excluding their entitled vehicles. The total consumption of fuel pertaining to seven vehicles was 42,904 litres during a period of 23 months from January 1, 2021 to November 30, 2022.
Similarly, it has been observed that trackers/data loggers have not been installed in any of these vehicles which is in violation of the 203rd Management Committee meeting held on November 26, 2021. Furthermore, the expense of repair and maintenance of the seven vehicles MD was using was Rs 2.45 million along with 78 (one way) bookings of air travel to or from Karachi. Out of these 51 were marked as officials while the remaining 27 as private and total cost of air travel to/from Karachi was Rs 1.74 million out of which Rs 1.25 million was treated as official and Rs 0.49 million as private.
Detailed scrutiny of air travel is still under process and sufficient documentary evidence is not available to ascertain that all these visits were for official purposes only, said a copy of internal audit report of SNGPL.
A copy of notice available with profit also disclosed that the FIA has asked SNGPL to depute a focal person who should be well conversant with the matter and not implicated in the enquiry for further coordination and early provision of important record related to civil works, details of contractor, procurements (indenting, tendering, purchase, storage) through Camps and Head Office, expenditures, payments in lieu of POL, revenue record of land purchase, crop compensation, details of official tours of all officers and staff etc.
In the same vein, FIA has asked to provide details of place of postings in the last 10 years. Furthermore, FIA has asked six officials of SNGPL including Sibghatullah Suri, (SGM) Projects, Khalid Nawaz, Chief Engineer projects, Muhammad Sohail, EIC, South Camp, Naseer Kiani, EIC Laki Marwat Camp, Amjad Khan, EIC Bannu Camp and Altaf Shah, Supervisor Civil Works of SNGPL to submit details of their assets.
“A non-compliance of the above or failure to make an honest disclosure will entail that you have nothing to say in your defence and the investigation will proceed on the basis of irrefutable incriminating material available on record, said a copy of FIA notice which was sent to Suri.
It is pertinent to mention that PM Sharif is not satisfied with the performance of MD SSGCL and MD SNGPL and he has taken serious notice of the “poor performance” of MDs over their failure to achieve the assigned targets and failing to control gas losses worth billions of rupees. Secretary Petroleum, on finding a directive from the PM Office, has sought explanation from both the MDs on priority as the PM directed the petroleum division to hold the management of two companies accountable for failure to achieve the assigned targets.
So far, both sui companies have failed to meet the assigned targets and they also also fell short of UfG reduction target in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022
Owing to “poor performance”, and failure in meeting loss cutting targets (unaccounted for Gas) which resulted in the loss of billions of rupees, besides depriving Balochistan from the gas supply in winter season have made the premier unhappy with the performance of the MDs of SNGPL & SSGCL, sources earlier told Profit.
