ISLAMABAD, Aug 31 (APP):Senate Standing Committee on Petroleum here Friday suggested for probing the matter of import, pricing and long-term contract agreement for Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) between Pakistan and Qatar Gas by involving the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).
The committee met here with Mohsin Aziz in the chair, discussed in detail the import pricing and
long term contract with Qatar Gas and present LNG supply prices per Million Meters British Thermal
Units (MMBUT) based on current crude oil price and dollar rupee parity.
Senator Mohsin observed that some things were documented and some were not documented
and proper expertise were required to look into the matter as a lot of technicalities were involved in
the multi-billion import deal.
He said that the last meeting of the committee, which was held in-camera due to confidentiality
of some clauses of the agreement had reveled nothing and asked the official concerned to apprise the meeting about such clauses if these really exist.
Meanwhile, Minister for Petroleum Ghulam Sarwar Khan informed the meeting that NAB was
probing into the matter and ministry would cooperate in this regard.
The minister said that he had held a meeting with the oil and Gas Regulatory Authority and discussed the details about the projects being executed in Balochistan province and status of such projects after the 18th constitutional amendment.
He said that by the next week he would also visit the province and review all the agreements as
the government was determined to provide the maximum benefit of these projects to the people of Balochistan and ensure their socio-economic uplift.
The minister said that a special focus had been paid on energy sector in Prime Minister first
100-day plan and a special task force would also be formed in the ministry, which would monitor the
grant of license and implementation of the work on those projects to exploit the existing energy
reserves to overcome the power shortage.
The Secretary Committee said that the committee would review the issuance of licenses and implementation and progress of the projects after every three months in order to expedite the pace of
work on these oil and gas projects.
Meanwhile, the Managing Director of OGDCL informed that committee that work on 7 blocks for exploration of oil and gas was in progress and some reserves were also discovered with low gas pressure.
The senior official of the Ministry of Petroleum apprised the committee about the pricing
mechanism of petroleum products and was told that it was linked with international market prices of petroleum products published in the platts oilgram.
The meeting was attended by the Senators Sardar Muhammad Azam Khan Musakhe, Shamim
Afridi, AttaUr Rahman, Taj Muhammad Afridi.