MAOISTS CONCLUDE PRESIDENT ACTED UNCONSTITUTIONALLY UPDATE Kathmandu, 24 Nov.: A meeting of Maoist central secretariat Saturday morning concluded a presidential call to assemble a government of national consensus in a week by Thursday afternoon was unconstitutional . Maoist Chairman Prachandaa went to Shital Niwas immediately for consultation with with the head of state. RAMESHWOR THAPA SELLS ALL SHARES OF KANTIPUR PUBLICATIONS TO KAILASH SIROHIYA Kathmandu, 24 Nov.: Rameshwor Thapa , one of the directors of Kantipur Publications (Pvt) Ltd and Kantipur FM (Pvt) Ltd, has left the two organizations, announcement of the media group said Saturday. Thapa tendered his resignation from the management committees of the two companies on Friday. He sold all the shares that he owned in the companies to the Chairman of Kantipur Publications and the Kantipur FM, Kailash Sirohiya. The managements of the publications and the FM have extended their thanks to Thapa for his contribution to the two companies. nnnn GOVT.,,ADB AGREE ON 20 PERCENT FOR MELAMCHI CONTRACTOR Kathmandu, 24 Nov.: Differences between the government and the Asian Development Bank ( ADB ) over making advance payment to the contractor of the Melamchi Drinking Water Project (MDWP) were resolved on Fridaym Ashok Thapa writes in The Kathmandu Post.. The ADB , the major donor to the project aimed at easing Kathmandu’s chronic water shortage by bringing water from the Melamchi River through a 26.5-km tunnel, has agreed with the government on limiting the advance payment to 20 percent. Divergent views emerged some months ago after the ADB insisted on paying the contractor 25 percent of the contract amount up front. The government did not want to go above 20 percent citing restrictions in the Procurement Act. The Melamchi Water Supply Development Board (MWSDB), the project’s implementing agency, had paid 15 percent of the bid amount to the previous contractor, China Railway 15 Bureau Group. The amount of the advance payment was increased to 20 percent at the insistence of the ADB . Board officials said that it was not final that it would pay 20 percent to the contractor to be hired for the project. “The advance money will be paid in a lump sum only after the contractor deposits a matching amount as bank guarantee,” said a source. The disagreement had prevented the MWSDB from inviting tenders for a new contractor as scheduled. The tender issue had been planned for Nov 9 with the last date of submission set for Jan 7, 2013. The postponed tender notice means the project could be delayed. MWSDB director general Krishna Prashad Acharya said that ADB headquarters in Manila had agreed to paying 20 percent after the board explained its position in a letter sent on Thursday. “We are happy that the differences between us have been cleared,” said Acharya, adding that it would pave the way for issuing the tender notice. He said that the board had also sent a copy of the bid document to the ADB for its approval. “Once the donor endorses the bid document, the tender notice will probably be published next week,” he added. Meanwhile, the long-awaited Melamchi project has been rescheduled for completion in March 2016. It had been originally planned to be finished in 2015, but the timetable had to be revised after the contract with the Chinese firm was terminated. The board has also inserted a carrot-and-stick provision in the new bid document to encourage the contractor to finish the project before the deadline. Ghanashyam Bhattarai, deputy director general of the board, said the reward or penalty could be up to 10 percent of the bid amount. nnnn CHINESE COMPNY REPLACES 2,000 SUBSTANDARD TRANSFORMERS Kathmandu, 24 Nov.: Hu Bei Sunlight Electric Co has dispatched genuine transformers to Nepal to replace a batch of inferior products it had shipped earlier. A probe committee set up by the buyer Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) had concluded that the transformers it had supplied were substandard, and the Chinese company had promised to rectify its mistake. NEA sources said that the company had already sent 2,000 sets of transformers to Nepal. “The transformers have arrived at Calcutta Port and will be in Birgunj within a week,” said a high level source. After problems appeared in the equipment imported from China and Thailand in the last five years, the NEA had formed a probe committee to study the matter. The inferior transformers had resulted in higher leakage, and a number of them had broken down. The committee led by NEA board member Krishna Prashad Dulal had examined 4,657 transformers installed at several stations and sub-stations. The NEA has imported transformers from a Thai company Sahabhant Electric and four Chinese companies—Shenyang Dongneng Electricity Equipment, SVR Electrical and Sichuan Dongfang Transformer. The first probe committee had concluded that the imported transformers were technically flawed and that NEA officials were responsible. When the report of the malpractice by Hu Bei was made public, company representatives had apologized and pledged to replace the faulty equipment. The probe committee had discovered during its inspection of transformers installed in Sindhupalchok and other distribution centres that aluminium wire had been used instead of copper wire, resulting in inferior quality. The company had sold 2,000 transformers of 25, 50, 100, 200 and 300 kV capacities to the NEA. The report prepared by the committee had stated that the company’s transformers were found to have 66 percent more “no loss” and “full load loss” than the NEA’s set standard. The source said that once the NEA receives the new transformers, it will decide where they will be installed. “The Chinese company has sent replacements, but that’s not the end of the matter. We have to recover the losses caused by the faulty products they sent earlier,” said an NEA official. Officials have also demanded stern action against the persons involved in the import of the substandard transformers. Another committee formed some months ago had concluded that around 30 NEA officials including acting managing director Mahendra Lal Shrestha and general managers Upendra Dev Bhatta, Chiranjibi Poudel and Ganesh Prasad Raj were involved. However, after energy secretary Hari Ram Koirala cleared acting managing director Shrestha, no further action has been taken against the others. Meanwhile, the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) has also been probing the alleged irregularities in the import of the substandard transformers. nnnn