The government on Wednesday has dissolved the entire management board of the Pakistan State Oil (PSO).
According to ministry of petroleum officials, the government also suspended Oil & Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) Chairman Saeed Ahmad Khan for three months for the same reason.
The official added that at firts government sought the chairman’s resignation, but he refused to do so, on the grounds that OGRA was not responsible for the crisis and hence he should not be made to resign.
The inquiry committee lead by prime minister’s advisor on petroleum, Zahid Muzaffar, also held OGRA responsible for the crisis as it was OGRA’s responsibility to ensure at least a reserve of 20 days’ oil supply at the nation’s oil companies. T
The OGRA chairman, rejected stating that responsibility falls to the petroleum ministry, not GRA, and as a regulator it was responsible for helping ensure that the 20-day storage infrastructure was built, not for the maintenance of inventory.
Saeed Ahmad Khan pointed out that it is the petroleum minister’s Director General Oil who meets with oil companies every month to review the state of their inventories.
According to PSO officials, PSO was unable to buy fuel for two major reasons. one, that power companies were not able to pay their fuel bills to PSO on agreed terms, due to which PSO to default on its obligations to its international suppliers. Secondly, in December, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar personally intervened to prevent PSO from buying US dollars from the currency markets to make payments to international suppliers.
