JSC meeting furore

A National Energy Corporation (NEC) executive has written Independent Senator Mary King expressing his dismay at being deemed “disrespectful” to the Joint Select Committee of Parliament which she chairs.

NEC’s vice president of business development Andrew Jupiter, in a letter to King, said that on the morning of April 19, when the committee last sat to discuss the Government’s energy projects, he told the committee’s secretary Lily Broomes that he was unwell.

Jupiter said he spoke to Broomes when he got to the parliamentary chambers. “I indicated to her that I was not feeling well and wished to be excused from attending the sitting,” he said.

Jupiter reminded King that he spoke to her too at her office in the Parliament, when Broomes escorted him there. “You enquired of me whether I had any additional information to relay to the committee based on the last sitting and I indicated that unless I could be of any further assistance, I had no additional information to advance. I was then excused from attending the sitting of the committee and you wished me well,” Jupiter stated.

However King, in reply yesterday, said Jupiter was not invited to appear before the committee for the April 19 meeting.

She said Jupiter appeared before the committee the week before and could not answer any of the committee’s questions. The committee therefore decided to invite “the more senior person” for its April 19 meeting, she said.

“Therefore I could not be referring to Mr Jupiter when I said I will be writing Parliament as to the respect or disrespect shown to the committee,” she said.

Among the top players who failed to show at the committee’s meeting, after being invited, were National Energy Task Force chairman Prof Ken Julien, National Energy Company president Prakash Saith and National Gas Company/NEC chairman Keith Awong.

La Brea MP Hedwige Bereaux also got upset with King, whom he wrote complaining about the manner in which the meeting was convened.