Pakistan People’s Party Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Tuesday accused the federal government of deliberately creating electricity crisis to victimise the people and divert their attention from the Panama Leaks and other misdeeds of the Sharif government across the country, especially in Sindh and Karachi.
In a press statement issued on Tuesday, the PPP chairman said that electricity need of the country was 23,700 megawatt while the total power generation capacity was 23,600. So, there was a meager shortfall of just 100 megawatt, he added. “But the federal government and its electric companies have inflicted an artificial shortfall of 7,000 MW on the people during the severe heatwave,” he added.
He said the Nawaz Sharif government paid hundreds of billions rupees circular debt and, in some cases, the extra payments were made to the IPPs but still it resorted to artificial load shedding on the consumers to burn them in the scorching heat.
Bilawal said that providing electricity was a state function as per their constitution and the world over it remained the same but the PML-N government was targeting the people with unannounced load shedding and mock power breakdowns which should be vehemently condemned by every Pakistani. He further said the Sindh province was producing surplus electricity but its length and breadth had been subjected to unbearable load shedding by the PML-N government.
He condemned the attitude of K-Electric which, he said was only minting money and fleecing the people of Karachi without supplying them electricity. “The K-Electric has capacity 1,800 MW and 1,000 MW supply from other resources including IPPs and WAPDA. But it generates only 400 MW through gas-fired power plants and has practically shut down its furnace oil power plants to save billions of rupees in profits,” he added.
Bilawal said that old areas of Karachi including Lyari, Kharadar, Keamari and other poor localities were specially targeted with 8-12 hours of load shedding. Residents of Lyari were even compelled to hold a Dharna outside K-Electric office the other against the discriminatory attitude of concerned authorities.
He also warned the K-Electric, HESCO and SEPCO to stop issuing inflated bills to the consumers and improve their performance without any delay. Otherwise, the people won’t tolerate this victimisation and come out on roads against them, he further warned.