KATHMANDU, Dec 20: The Ministry of Energy has sacked three board members of Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) on charges of non-cooperation to a campaign to reduce power outage.
The board members -- Suraj Lamichhane, Manoj Mishra and Laxman Agrawal -- were sacked by a ministerial-level decision on December 15, according to Gokarna Raj Pantha, the assistant spokesperson for the energy ministry. “The ministry has appointed Bhakta Bahadur Pun, Chet Raj Joshi and Umesh Prasad Dhani as the three new board members of NEA.”
The sacked trio had drawn the energy ministry’s flak for opposing a number of key agendas tabled by NEA’s Managing Director Kulman Ghising in the board meeting.
3 NEA board members prevent MD from setting up subsidiaries
The ministry had sought clarification from the trio after they wrote separate minutes in the board meeting on November 25.
They had also forwarded the minutes to the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), asking for the anti graft body to look into the energy utility.
In the minutes, the three had objected to Ghising’s decisions on employee transfers and the signing of power purchase agreements (PPA), among other things, claiming that only the board can decide on such issues.
The NEA board has seven members.
The Ministry had sought clarification from them after their repeated opposition to Ghising’s proposal.
After receiving their clarifications, the ministry sacked them saying that their clarification was not justifiable.
