Pak paid USD100 million penalty to ADB for failing to implement projects in last 15 years

Showing a classic example of "bad governance" in implementing "donor-funded" projects in Pakistan, the country paid approximately USD100 million penalty to the Asian Development Bank (ADB) for its failure to implement some projects during the last 15 years.

Various governments in the country since 2006 paid foreign exchange reserves of approximately USD100 million, reported The News.

"The ADB imposed 0.15 per cent amount as commitment charges on signed projects if the executing agencies failed to deliver on the implementation of projects within the stipulated time-frame and signed loan amount was not disbursed," The News quoted top official sources as saying.

Citing an example of "bad governance" in Pakistan, the newspaper reported that an amount of USD900 million was approved by the ADB for the Jamshoro Power project for the generation of 660MW of electricity through coal fire technology in 2014 with 2019 as its expected deadline. However, the project was not completed till date.

The ADB has disbursed less than 50 per cent amount ranging around $313 million, so Islamabad is forced to pay the penalty as commitment charges, reported the newspaper.

Another example of "bad governance" is the smart metering project that is funded by the ADB and approved in 2015-16, however, the said project has not been stated after nearly 5 years of its approval.

The total amount Pakistan has paid as the commitment charges in pockets every year starting from 2006 till June 2021 mount to nearly USD100 million in the last 15 years.

( With inputs from ANI )

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