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dam-l LS:WB Involvement in 10,800-MW Karnali-Chisapani, Nepal?
Source: Kathmandu Post, Dec. 20, 1999.
Enron not given survey licence for Chisapani
By a Post Reporter
KATHMANDU, Dec 19 - Former Water Resources Minister Pashupati SJB Rana
says the US energy
giant Enron had not yet been issued a survey licence to develop
Karnali-Chisapani.
'The political consensus was only on giving a go-ahead to a preliminary
study,' Rana told an interaction program here today. 'It is not a survey
licence. We went
ahead after the World Bank gave its commitment to provide financial
assistance on its projects that
would go along the Karnali-Chisapani,' Rana said at the Nepal Concerns
Society's weekly
forum.
Newspapers early this month reported that the ruling NC, CPN (UML), RPP
and CPN(ML) had finally
reached the ever-elusive political consensus to allow a survey licence
to Enron.
Rana, the RPP secretary general, represented his party in the
four-party talks. The ruling NC was
represented by Minister for Water Resources Govind Raj Joshi, UML
politburo member Pradeep
Nepal, RPP’s secretary general Rana, and Hiranya Lal Shrestha of
CPN(ML).
“The political consensus was conditional,” Rana said.
According to the talks’ minutes, Enron has to meet three demands before
it is issued the survey
license: benefits accruing from the Karnali-Chisapani project to the
lower riparian country must be
ascertained; physical infrastructure such as clean drinking water,
education and proper sanitation
have to be ensured at the project site; and the World Bank’s pipe-line
contributions to Nepal should
not be affected by the project’s financing. Apart from Rana, no other
participants in the four-party talks
attended today’s interaction.
At the forum experts said successive governments since 1990 have
allowed multi-nationals into the
country’s power sector ignoring cheaper projects which can be developed
using local expertise, said
experts today. “The government views the multinational companies as
donor countries,” said Deepak
Gyawali, a hydropower expert. “As a matter of fact, they are here
merely for business gains.”
According to Gyawali, the government’s handling of the power sector
leaves much to be desired. “We
are not even informed when a treaty is signed with foreign companies,”
said Gyawali. “ We are only
informed by the national dailies.”
Experts said the recent “political consensus” to allow Enron a survey
license to develop the
10,800-MW Karnali-Chisapani was not comprehensive. They claimed there
were strong differences
within political parties on whether or not to allow the American
company to develop Karnali.
Gyawali said such agreements, “which involved only four politicians in
a room”, cannot be termed a
“political consensus”. “The decision is even against Article 126 of the
constitution.”
Article 126 requires a two-thirds majority of the members present at a
joint sitting of both Houses of
Parliament to endorse any bilateral agreements on natural resources,
its distribution and uses.
“The government hardly considers if the nation can profit from the
projects. They are only interested in
projects profitable to them (officials),” said Dr. Hari Man Shrestha,
former water resource secretary
who now champions small-power projects. “Big projects only increase our
electricity tariffs.”
He said the government is giving priority to projects such as
Karnali-Chisapani despite their
non-sustainability. “The project has been developed to sell electricity
to India. And the foreign
company will take away the profits,” he said