What better time to look back?
Nobody really believed Shahbaz Sharif’s six-month boast about ending load shedding on the last campaign trail. Even Nawaz dismissed it – before the election. But there was a general feeling that PML-N seemed determined to do a better job on electricity, at least, than PPP. The one-chunk Rs500b odd payoff of the circular debt immediately after coming to office, though dubious in so many ways, did reset the system. The main problem, at the end of the day, was not capacity to produce, but rather the hundreds of billions stuck in non-payments, choking DISCOs, GENCOs, etc, to the point of shutting down the system itself.
Yet load shedding has stayed right at the top of the government’s problems right through this cycle, with no prospects of improvement in the final lap. Also, the circular debt is past the Rs500b mark again. And since there was no audit of the last payment, and the problem has crept right back to where it was when PML-N first tried to tackle it, the ruling party has effectively sent Rs500b straight to money heaven with nothing to show. Once again, we’re erecting one power plant after another, but failure to ensure payment remains unchecked.
There’s only so long the government can CPEC its way out of questions regarding the economy. With the budget approaching – where all important targets will be missed, as usual – the finance minister will have some tough questions to answer regarding the bloated deficit. Even CPEC can achieve only so much when its trade highways cut through land with no power – electricity, gas – to leverage the spillover. Yet once again PML-N is making promises of ending load shedding. But this time they’re being more realistic about the time frame; rightly asking for another five years.
