Govt nominates Naveed Ismail on K Electric Board
Aftab Ahmed
Islamabad: The government has nominated Naveed Ismail to represent on the Board of directors of K-Electric.
K Electric is a utility company that operates in Karachi and has a board of directors to look into policy matters of K-electric.
He is currently holding charge of Chairman National Transmission and Despatch Company (NTDC).
The Government had appointed Mr. Naveed Ismail as the Chairperson of the National Transmission and Despatch Company (NTDC) on January 28, 2021.
The power division proposed to nominate Mr. Naveed Ismail as the third representative of the Government of Pakistan on the Board of K-Electric. The other two government nominees on the Board may continue to be officers each, not below BS 21 from the Power and Finance Divisions.
Earlier, Mr. Naveed Ismail had been appointed as the CEO, Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) at a whopping salary of Rs.4.2 million. He was also the CEO when KESC signed an agreement with the Government of Pakistan (GOP), in which he obtained substantial benefits for KESC by signing an Amendment Agreement on April 13, 2009.
Chairman Wapda had terminated the contract of Mr. Naveed Ismail’s contract, in 2013, while he was serving as the CEO, GHCL on the directions of the competent authority.
Simultaneously, however, Mr. Ismail had been given the three most key portfolios, including Managing Directorship (MD) of NTDC and Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO).
Mr. Ismail is currently the founder and CEO of Lumen Energia—an independent power company with the management control of KarGres-1, a 135MW combined heat and power plant and developing a 50-100 MW waste gas to power project for Arcelor Mittal Steel.
It is also developing a 300 MW power business for the Bassel Group, meaning that this person has a severe conflict of interest as an essential part of the Government. He has also held top positions at AES and remained CEO of GENCOs Holding Company and NTDC.
The K-Electric is a corporate entity with its independent Board of Directors.
The Government of Pakistan is a minor shareholder in pursuance of the Share Purchase Agreement and now holds 24.34% shares. Initially, the Board of Directors’ composition of K-Electric was as KESC nominated ten directors and government three directors.
Under Section 6 of the Code of Corporate Governance, 2017, the Independent Directors of each listed company shall not be less than 1/3 of the total number of directors on BoD.
