Suo motu action: SC retrieves $12m from rental power firm

Walters International agrees to return Rs2 billion to the government of Pakistan.

ISLAMABAD:

The Supreme Court has succeeded in retrieving $12 million paid illegally to the Walters Power International (WPI) for its Naudero-II project in a suo motu action taken on The Express Tribune’s report highlighting irregularities in the entire deal.

WPI counsel Shahid Hamid says he will soon file a damages claim against the Central Power Generation Company for hindering the project.

The three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry resumed the hearing on Wednesday.

The counsel for Walters Power International Shahid Hamid appeared before the bench on Tuesday and ensured that the money would be returned.

“This money belongs to the nation,” the Chief justice remarked while appreciating the company for returning the money, adding: “You have fulfilled a national obligation.”

Later, the court adjourned the hearing till December 14 upon assurances by the Walters International for depositing the money in the national exchequer by the evening.

Later, Shahid Hamid told reporters that his client received $11m in advance and now would file a $14m damages suit against Genco, adding his client heavily invested in purchase of machinery, installations and labour work but in return the company neither  provided gas nor got the tariff approved.

In the evening, the company deposited the money in the national exchequer and submitted a compliance report before the SC.

The Supreme Court had taken suo motu action after The Express Tribune reported that Nepra had declined to approve a fresh tariff for the Naudero-II power project after discovering that the project’s equipment belonged to the Guddu rental power project.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 9th, 2010.