KATHMANDU, Aug 4: The World Bank has argued that the decision to award contract of Solar Power Plant conforms to the procurement policies and practices of its members.
The multilateral donor’s comment came after the parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Tuesday directed the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) to scrap its decision of awarding contract to Risen Co Energy Ltd, saying the contract process breached procurement laws. But the World Bank on Friday said that its attention has been drawn based on media reports of the matter.
Digitization of social allowance in progress
The NEA management had decided to award the contract worth Rs 3.88 billion (US $ 37.9 million plus NRs 13.5 million) to Risen Co Energy Limited. The bidder ranked fourth in the financial proposal. But the NEA’s evaluation team found concluded that the firm have sound technical proposal. The World Bank approved NEA’s evaluation accordingly.
Takuya Kamata, the World Bank’s Country Manager for Nepal, said: “We can confirm that following extensive review, the award of contract managed by the NEA under this project conforms with the procurement policies and practices adopted by the 189 member governments of the World Bank Group, as well as the financing agreement between the Government of Nepal and the Bank.”
The bank, however, said that it was yet to receive any official communication from the concerned authorities on recent developments reported in the media. “Therefore, it would be premature to speculate upon the World Bank’s future role in that project,” added Kamata. The NEA was implementing the ‘Grid Solar and Energy Efficiency Project’ to install solar power plant in the area covered by Kulekhani Reservoir and Devighat Hydropower Project.
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