The government on Thursday removed heads of three public sector oil and gas companies - Pakistan Petroleum Limited (PPL), Interstate Gas Systems (ISGS) and Government Holding Private Limited (GHPL) - under its restructuring plan.
The government is replacing heads of eight major organisations in the oil and gas sector after alleged failure to deliver in the face of energy crisis.
Petroleum ministry spokesperson Zafar Iqbal Qadir confirmed the removal of managing directors of the three companies after approval of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani.
The government removed ISGS managing director Hilal A Raza and placed Mubeen Sulat as acting managing director. Raza was working on the Iran-Pakistan and Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline projects.
PPL managing director Khalid Rehman was demoted to the slot of deputy managing director while the current deputy managing director Asim Murtaza was made acting managing director.
Ministry of Petroleum’s Additional Secretary Zafar Iqbal Qadir was given the charge of acting managing director of GHPL following the ouster of MD Raja Irfan Nasar.
In the first phase, the government removed chiefs of Pakistan State Oil, Sui Northern Gas Pipelines and Oil and Gas Development Company. The acting chiefs will continue to work till regular appointments, which will be done by inviting applications from candidates through advertisements.
In another step to lift the energy sector, the government paid Rs120 billion overdue electricity subsidies this month to improve the financial condition of the power companies.
Published in The Express Tribune, May 13th, 2011.
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