The Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) on Friday appealed to the prime minister to disband National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) for its failure to protect consumers’ interests under Clause 31 of the NEPRA Act.
LCCI President Irfan Qaiser Sheikh took strong exception to NEPRA’s move to increase electricity tariff by 83 per cent (Rs6.50 per unit) for the billing month of April, the single largest raise in the history of Pakistan, under monthly fuel adjustment mechanism. He said the unprecedented increase would break NEPRA’s own record of Rs3.03 per unit increase allowed a few days ago to be recovered in the billing of month of March.
He also said the combined effect of the two increases will be about 123 per cent that will translate into an additional burden of Rs9.53 per unit on all consumers.
Irfan Qaiser Sheikh said the price of electricity for consumers using 301-700 units per month is Rs10.65 per unit and for those utilising more than 700 units per month it is Rs13.29. It means, he indicated, these two increases would double the price of electricity. He opined that the NEPRA move is bound to increase the incidence of electricity theft that already hovering around 25 per cent of the 22 per cent line losses and eating up Rs50-75 billion.
The LCCI president observed that NEPRA officials pose that they regularly conduct public hearings but in fact NEPRA try to fool masses. They made announcements in the English press and hold these public meetings in air-conditioned halls of five star hotels, where common man has no access to express feedback. He suggested that NEPRA should announce these meetings on both national print and electronic media in Urdu language and choose a public place for these so called public hearing.
He questioned how industry would remain competitive at such high price of electricity, which was one of the basic industrial raw materials. We already have the highest tariff in our region as in India, the electricity tariff for industry is 10.5 cents, in Bangladesh 10.75 cents and in Sri Lanka it is again 10.75 cent whereas in Pakistan tariff is already 15 cents meaning that 45 per cent higher as compared to the region. With this proposed massive and unprecedented increase, Pakistan will have double the tariff of electricity what the regional countries are offering to their trade and industries leaving Pakistan totally uncompetitive and unviable in the international marketplace.
“The country had already lost a number of international markets to China, Bangladesh and India due to high-cost of doing business and the decision to increase power tariff would make the Pakistani goods more uncompetitive.”
He said the business community was unable to understand why instead of taking measures to control line losses and enhance cheap power generation up to capacity, policies are being evolved to add to the miseries of the business people.
Irfan said negative growth witnessed by the Large Scale Manufacturing sector was indeed an eye opener and a wakeup call for the government. He said the industry needs cheaper electricity to keep units operational and complete the export orders well within the given timeframe, but only because of the shortage of electricity exports are being compromised.
