But for how long?
The prophets of doom were predicting a highly gloomy picture of the power situation at the beginning of the year. It was maintained that there would be huge power shortages and load shedding in 2012 and the shortfall of power generation could cross 4500MW. In October last, unscheduled outages ranging from 12 hours to 18 hours had hit all the four provinces with almost equal ferocity. The power breakdowns had slowed down the wheels of industry and in cases brought them to a grinding halt. There were widespread protests and factory owners at various places came out on the streets along with their workers. Various reasons were given to explain the crisis: A lack of investment in existing plants, outdated grids, line losses, rampant electricity theft, closure of canals for desilting, a technical fault in Chashma Nuclear Power Plant, and to crown it all the circulatory debt. It was revealed that Pepco owed Rs 210 billion to power generating companies which in turn failed to pay PSO the outstanding bills amounting to about Rs 155 billion, leading the oil marketing company to suspend its supplies to the companies.
And now suddenly, we have the good news. Like a magician taking out a rabbit from under an empty hat, Naveed Qamar has produced the missing power. Let there be light, he says, and there is light. But at this time and age people are wary of any unexplained tour de force. How can you do it, they ask? Qamar maintains that line losses have been decreased, capacity of the power plants enhanced, electricity prices rationalised and the system of recovery of service charges improved. The explanations are too simplistic to convince many. There is no word about how the cash-strapped government is going to pay off Pepco’s debt.
Coming as it does in the election year, many ask if it is a gimmick to win over voters. While the government deserves to be congratulated for ending power shortages, one wonders how long the power will continue to flow uninterrupted.
