PAC body told recovery cases of Rs27b pending in LHC

ISLAMABAD: The Subcommittee of the Public Accounts Committee was told on Thursday that the cases of over Rs27 billion recoverable amount of the Competition Commission of Pakistan from Engro corporation, cement, sugar and poultry cartels has been pending in the Lahore High Court since long.

The PAC Subcommittee proposed transferring of these cases to any other judge of the LHC. The Subcommittee held a meeting on Thursday with the chair of its Convener Syed Naveed Qamar in which the audit paras related to the Finance Division, and its attached departments for the financial year 2016-17 were examined.

The audit officials told the Subcommittee that the Competition Commission of Pakistan has imposed the penalties over Rs27 billion, but these penalties were not recovered since 2008. The Subcommittee inquired the reasons of not recovering of penalties. CCP officials told the committee that the cases were pending in the courts of law and the penalties were imposed on the different cartels.

To the inquiry of PAC member Sardar Ayaz Sadiq about the names of the cartels, the audit officials told the committee that cartels includes Engro corporation, cement, sugar, poultry.

The CCP officials told the committee that there were total 163 defaulters and 80 percent of amount has to be recovered from 17 defaulters and out of these cartels, 8 of cement, 2 of telecom, Engro, Poultry association and PSO. When Sardar Ayaz Sadiq inquired about the court where these cases were pending, the officials of the CCP told the committee that these cases were pending in the Lahore High Court before Justice Ayesha Malik.

Examining another audit para, the audit officials told the committee that the regulatory authorities (Security Exchange Commission of Pakistan, Nepra, Ogra and Pemra) has to pay three percent amount from fees and charges to CCP, but these could not yet pay Rs2.5 billion to the CCP from this head. The Subcommittee directed the CCP to recover this amount from the regulatory authorities.