Coal mines million dollars for Sri Lankan Polity-officers

(Lanka-e-News-23.April.2013,1.30PM) The electricity tariff increase is now showing its hidden dreadful nature and will remove the last resorts of the downtrodden masses who just make a
living, forgetting their hoped cool life through Mahinda Chinthana. Just to smoothen the agony of the blow the government propaganda releases the
last creature of the Pandora’s box – the hope of getting prices down through the next coal plants. Question is whether it is a reality to reduce prices after the next 300MW which will be completed by October 2013?

Let us take the main ingredient of the coal power assuming the plant will be ready by this October; the coal part. Currently we are almost in April 2013. The rough sea caused by the South West monsoon will start by May 2013. As everybody knows by now coal can’t be unloaded from ships during this season. That will leave the CEB with only a month to deliver coal for the new 2nd plant in October 2013.

Having understood the crust of the issue, let us see how CEB can make coal available for the new power plant.

1. The ongoing contract which was awarded to the Noble two years ago is at a higher price arrived through cunning manipulations. The attached is an extract of a petition sent to Bribery and Corruption Commission on this wrong deal. It shows that the tender should have been awarded to the Holcim and the loss made by the “deal” is about 4,367,776.00 $ equivalent to RS 545,971,982.00. Coal could be purchased from the same party for the anticipated 2nd plant also. In fact as at now the Norochcholei CPP operators are pressed hard by the Noble to receive coal shipments over & above the requirement.

2. There is a new tender floated in October 2012, to procure coal for the new year, whole plant including old & new machines. The tender was to complete by November 2012, but practically finalized by January 2013, at a lesser cost than present prices of Noble. Surreptitiously this was stopped by a legal point which is only applied to Taurian – the lowest (but not applied for Noble who has a similar fault) and tender evaluation is reshaped. Still the tender can’t be concluded with repetitive legal battles. Had the lowest bidder was awarded; CEB would get coal at 108 USD/MT against the present price of 140 + USD/ MT.

3. The 3rd logical possibility is cancelling the 2nd coal tender and extending the 1st tender at the same prices in favor of Noble. That will increase the cost of coal plant operation over LKR 5,400 million per year.

This situation can be summarized by a Sinhala saying – “Watath Niyarath Goyam ka nam kata pawasamu ae amaruwa”. When the administrators of the country who have been vested the responsibility are not doing so but use the opportunity to create business deals for their benefits at colossal losses to the country, what is the fate of citizens of Sri Lanka. Same maestro who is ill famous for many such deals is behind the game plan.

So electricity consumers!

Should we pay the increased tariff to strengthen the corruption? Shouldn’t we unite against this and refrain from settling electricity bills for 3 months as gesture of protest?

First Coal tender – case study for future auditors as reference
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A copy of a anonymous petition sent to the Bribery & Corruption Commission giving exact and detailed proceedings of the tender is annexed herewith. To assist the reader a calculation based on those facts is also annexed herewith. This case is not taken up by the present judiciary or the Bribery Commission, for reasons known by all the country men and international community. One day this will be a sample case study for the industrial law students and auditing students.

Second Coal Tender – Bitter truth of the present use of law and order
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In the second coal tender, the same game plan as in first tender, could not be played as the evaluation was handled by CEB engineers. Initially the tender evaluation was in favor of Taurian Iron & Steel Co. Pvt. Ltd. Then the Secretary MOPE pulled a different card. He tabled a Supreme Court judgment happened in 2000, and raised doubts over TEC recommendation for Taurian citing they don’t have a local agent and therefore they are not qualified under the requirements of Public Contract Act. Then he wrote to SCAPC submitting the position of the Attorney General, which upheld the applicability of Public Contract Act 13 of 1987 in respect of this tender. As per this Act all public contracts & initial offers and the companies participating has to be registered before submitting the bid. However a big puzzle was artificially created as to whether a foreign bidder who makes a direct bid has to register or not.

Cold-war in CEB adds to its woes

by Ifham Nizam-April 22, 2013

With a cold war raging between a top Ceylon Electricity Board official, who is a senior engineer and others at senior management level consisting mostly engineers, the most powerful man in the Ceylon Electricity Board, General Manager, Nihal Wickramasuriya, has called a meeting in a bid to reconcile those at daggers drawn.

Wickremasuriya, who is the senior most engineer in the CEB, told The Island yesterday that he was not aware of the latest breakdown which had been blamed on a top official. However, he made immediate inquiries and said that the situation was under control as The Island exclusively reported on Saturday.

Of the internal rift at the first coal fired plant in Norochcholai, Wickramasuriya said apart from him, CEB Chairman Ariyaratne Ganegala and Power and Energy Ministry Secretary M. M. C. Ferdinando had also been informed of the internal dispute. However, none of the employees at Norochchclai had come out with full details, he said. "If it is a personal matter, steps would be taken to iron it out, if it is a technical, issue then I will be compelled to hold an inquiry into it."

Following the latest breakdown that lasted for about 24 hours, the plant resumed operations Friday night.

An engineer said that Norochcholai second plant was in the processes of being commissioned. "If such problems continue to occur we won’t be in a position to give an efficient service. Needless to say if the number of technical issues we have had faced since the first commissioning continues to plague us, then things will remain the same".

The Rs. 45 billion plant’s latest problem was chiefly due to alleged inefficient management that had led to a breakdown in the boiler when attempts were made to run it at full capacity on an ad hoc basis on Thursday night, sources said.