KARACHI: A long-term Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) contract that Pakistan signed with Qatar three years ago has landed two of the country’s top former officials, a former Prime Minister and Finance minister, into jail on suspicion of corruption- a charge that opposition leaders have termed the political victimization of political opponents.
The $16 billion sale and purchase agreement termed as a ‘game changer’ for Pakistan was signed between then Petroleum Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Chairman Qatargas, Saad Sherida, in February 2016, following frequent power outages and amid depleting gas resources. The deal was projected to meet the 20 percent increase in the demand of energy in the coming years, for the supply of up to 3.75 million tons of LNG every year for fifteen years. That 2016 deal also supplied Pakistan’s first LNG terminal.
Last month, Pakistan’s anti-graft agency, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) took Abbasi into custody on the grounds that he was stalling the investigation process by not responding to questions. Earlier this week, former finance minister Miftah Ismail was arrested in the case as well.
“This is nothing but victimization and harassment of political opponents,” PML-N Senator Saleem Zia, member of the senate’s Standing Committee on Petroleum, told Arab News.
“This despite the fact that Khaqan Abbasi has been openly cooperating with NAB,” he said, and added that as the case proceeds, “everything will be exposed.”
What that ‘everything’ is, still remains shrouded in mystery, as details of Pakistan’s accord with Qatar have not yet been made public. The arrests are adding to the uncertainty, with close to no information on the terms and conditions of the deal yet known.
As the opposition comes under increasing scrutiny by NAB, with former Prime Minister and PML-N party head Nawaz Sharif in jail for ten years, and his daughter, Maryam Nawaz arrested on Thursday, opposition leaders have accused the government of using the arrests to distract from its own incompetence.
“There is strong reaction from all parties and general public who believe that the government is making (arrests) to hide its incompetence. They should focus on other affairs because this is not going to solve the problems of the country including its economy,” Zia said.
In 2016, Pakistan’s then opposition parties had voiced their concern over the LNG deal made behind closed doors, and largely out of the public eye, while the PML-N government had defended the deal as Pakistan’s “best available option,” claiming it would save the country $1 billion every year.
“This agreement is being acknowledged globally as most cost effective deal for LNG. Pakistan will continue to import LNG from Qatar till 2032,” Abbasi had announced soon after signing the deal.
Following the deal, a contract for the country’s first LNG terminal was awarded to a local company which sparked criticism by opposition lawmakers who protested the lack of transparency.
According to NAB prosecutor, Sardar Muzaffar Abbasi, the contract awarded to the favored local company has cost the country more than a billion rupees in losses.
“Due to this flawed contract, the national exchequer has suffered Rs. 1.54 billion losses so far,” he argued in Islamabad High Court on Wednesday ahead of Miftah Ismail’s arrest.
According to Haider Waheed, who is Ismail’s lawyer, the NAB prosecutor did not give any details of losses incurred beyond quoting the figure.
“They do not know about it, and there are no losses at all,” Waheed said.
When contacted for comment, NAB prosecutor, Sardar Muzaffar decline to comment on the break-up of the loss figure.
Experts keeping a close eye on developments say that the Qatar deal was thrown into doubts after analizing the terminals’ Return on Investment (RoI) and Return on equity (RoE). The re-gasification Terminal I and Terminal II have been set up in Karachi.
“The RoI and RoE on the investment in the LNG plant (Terminal I) is too high on both operational and non-operational level. That is a doubtful element and that is the pivotal point of the game,” Muzamil Aslam, senior economist, told Arab News. He added that no document was publicly available but the payment of a large amount as the penalty on non-utilization of terminals, suggested that returns were negotiated too high.
“There were positives and negatives of the LNG deal. Negative (points) being that the spot rates move down sometimes but (they) have made a long-term contract... to ensure supply. Negative is... why did you sign a fifteen year deal when you could have bought some quantity from the spot market and some through contract?” he said.
Additional Prosecutor General NAB, Nayyar Abbas Rizvi, said that irregularities that now led to the arrests were committed here on the Pakistan side, during the awarding of the contract to a local company, and also in the LNG deal with Qatar.
“There are many other things,” he said, but declined to give any further details about the high-profile case that yet remains shrouded in mystery.
How Qatar’s LNG deal landed former PM and Finance Chief in jail
How Qatar’s LNG deal landed former PM and Finance Chief in jail
- Details of $16 billion accord with Qatar in 2016 have not yet been made public
- Following the deal, a contract for the country’s first LNG terminal was awarded to awarded to the favoured local company - NAB
Pakistani politicians urge dialogue with Imran Khan’s party as PM offers talks
- National Dialogue Committee group organizes summit attended by prominent lawyers, politicians and journalists in Islamabad
- Participants urge government to lift alleged ban on political activities and media restrictions, form committee for negotiations
ISLAMABAD: Participants of a meeting featuring prominent politicians, lawyers and civil society members on Wednesday urged the government to initiate talks with former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, lift alleged bans on political activities after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif recently invited the PTI for talks.
The summit was organized by the National Dialogue Committee (NDC), a political group formed last month by former PTI members Chaudhry Fawad Husain, ex-Sindh governor Imran Ismail and Mehmood Moulvi. The NDC has called for efforts to ease political tensions in the country and facilitate dialogue between the government and Khan’s party.
The development takes place amid rising tensions between the PTI and Pakistan’s military and government. Khan, who remains in jail on a slew of charges he says are politically motivated, blames the military and the government for colluding to keep him away from power by rigging the 2024 general election and implicating him in false cases. Both deny his allegations.
Since Khan was ousted in a parliamentary vote in April 2022, the PTI has complained of a widespread state crackdown, while Khan and his senior party colleagues have been embroiled in dozens of legal cases. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif last month invited the PTI for talks during a meeting of the federal cabinet, saying harmony among political forces was essential for the country’s progress.
“The prime objective of the dialogue is that we want to bring the political temperatures down,” Ismail told Arab News after the conference concluded.
“At the moment, the heat is so much that people— especially in politics— they do not want to sit across the table and discuss the pertaining issues of Pakistan which is blocking the way for investment.”
Former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, who heads the Awaam Pakistan political party, attended the summit along with Jamaat-e-Islami senior leader Liaquat Baloch, Muttahida Quami Movement-Pakistan’s Waseem Akhtar and Haroon Ur Rashid, president of the Supreme Court Bar Association. Journalists Asma Shirazi and Fahd Husain also attended the meeting.
Members of the Pakistan Peoples Party, the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and the PTI did not attend the gathering.
The NDC urged Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, President Asif Ali Zardari and PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif to initiate talks with the opposition. It said after the government forms its team, the NDC will announce the names of the opposition negotiating team after holding consultations with its jailed members.
“Let us create some environment. Let us bring some temperatures down and then we will do it,” Ismail said regarding a potential meeting with the jailed Khan.
Muhammad Ali Saif, a former adviser to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief minister, told participants of the meeting that Pakistan was currently in a “dysfunctional state” due to extreme political polarization.
“The tension between the PTI and the institutions, particularly the army, at the moment is the most fundamental, the most prominent and the most crucial issue,” Saif noted.
‘CHANGED FACES’
The summit proposed six specific confidence-building measures. These included lifting an alleged ban on political activities and the appointment of the leaders of opposition in Pakistan’s Senate and National Assembly.
The joint communique called for the immediate release of women political prisoners, such as Khan’s wife Bushra Bibi and PTI leader Yasmin Rashid, and the withdrawal of cases against supporters of political parties.
The communiqué also called for an end to media censorship and proposed that the government and opposition should “neither use the Pakistan Armed Forces for their politics nor engage in negative propaganda against them.”
Amir Khan, an overseas Pakistani businessperson, complained that frequent political changes in the country had undermined investors’ confidence.
“I came here with investment ideas, I came to know that faces have changed after a year,” Amir Khan said, referring to the frequent change in government personnel.
Khan’s party, on the other hand, has been calling for a “meaningful” political dialogue with the government.
However, it has accused the government of denying PTI members meetings with Khan in the Rawalpindi prison where he remains incarcerated.
“For dialogue to be meaningful, it is essential that these authorized representatives are allowed regular and unhindered access to Imran Khan so that any engagement accurately reflects his views and PTI’s collective position,” PTI leader Azhar Leghari told Arab News last week.
