Pakistan Steel Mills Spokesman Shazim Akhtar clarified and stated that the news item published in the Daily Business Recorder dated: 30.06.2013, entitled “BoD Members: MoP Violating SC Decision?” is strongly refuted by PSM on the basis of following facts and figures.
It is not correct that two new nominated members on the Board of Director namely Kalb-e-Abbas Dharamsey and Ali Raza Ghewala as mentioned in the above news items were approved on the BoDs, Pakistan Steel by the former caretaker government, but as a matter of fact their nomination on the BoDs-PSM was approved by the former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf later on issued vide letter No 11(11)/01-PR-III-Steel; dated: May 9, 2013. However, consequent upon nomination of the two members as referred above, on the BoDs of PSM, the existing members were to be replaced to adjust new nominees to maintain maximum authorised strength on the BoDs. The deletion of existing members from the BoDs PSM was subsequently processed by Ministry of Production/Finance. Thereby decision of the nomination of two new members on the BoDs had the approval of the former prime minister of Pakistan Raja Pervez Ashraf.
The PSM Spokesman further clarified that the news related the seventh generation tender of Iron Ore (Lump & Fine), following six parties participated.
The offer of Intercont Industrial Co Ltd, Hong Kong $AMG Transportation LLC, US were rejected by the Tender Opening Committee (TOC) on the basis of lack of documents. Offers of remaining four bidders were technically evaluated by Technical Scrutiny Committee (TSC) and offer of CCBMM, Brazil was rejected on technical grounds. The offer of Ehya Sepehan Mining & Industries Complex Co, Iran, Cargill International Trading PTE Ltd, and ICIOC, Iran were recommended for commercial opening by TSC. The referred Iranian company has not made it conditional to supply the iron ore subject to the payment of their 1.5 billion rupees against previous supplies. Hence it is not true that single party was cleared for procurement of iron ore based on seventh generation.
It is also misleading that once the seventh generation long-term contract is awarded, legally no party can enter into the iron ore supply without tender and processing. Here the word “legally” has been used deliberately to aggravate the severity of the matter otherwise all know that PSM awards every contract after appropriate open tendering where any bidder can participate if he fulfils the tender conditions.
The point that the iron ore without L/C was received in past is also misleading as the referred party had supplied only two cargoes per MV Julian and MV Lancelot so far and the fact is that L/C for first vessel was established on 16.01.2013 and vessel arrived on 20.02.2013 and L/C for second vessel was established on 22.02.2013 whereas, the vessel arrived on 07.03.2013. Therefore the quoted claim is quite unfair, and unjustified.
The Spokesman also clarified that PSM invites offers of iron ore through open tendering strictly as per PPRA rules and as per internationally accepted specification. Such statements are given by those parties which try to accommodate inferior quality material through pressurising tactics.
