Mian Zahid calls for low-cost electricity for people, industries in winter
KARACHI (INP): Chairman of National Business Group Pakistan, President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum, and All Karachi Industrial Alliance, and former provincial minister Mian Zahid Hussain has said that the production capacity of electricity in the country is 40 thousand megawatts while consumption is only 10 to 12 thousand megawatts in winter.
In a statement on Monday, Mian Zahid Hussain said that people and businesses were forced to pay even though some industries were shut down in the winter and do not use electricity.
Instead of shutting down the electricity-generating plants during the four or five months of winter, they should be operated, and this electricity should be sold to cover operating costs only, he added.
He said that low-cost electricity should be provided to the public, commercial establishments, and agricultural and industrial sectors to increase economic activity.
Providing cheap power to industries will increase production, employment, export earnings, improve foreign exchange reserves, and thereby provide additional resources to the government for capacity payments.
The business leader said that supporting the industrial sector will increase production and reduce the price of various commodities, which will benefit the people. The government should finalize this matter as soon as possible and get permission from the IMF so that the same can be put into practice.
He said that electricity and gas have been made very expensive, due to which production costs and exports were affected. Implementation of this proposal will result in people benefiting from cheaper electricity in winter as natural gas was not available everywhere and LPG was very expensive.
He further said that according to an estimate, by making electricity cheaper, its use will increase by 25% across the country and up to 35% in Karachi, and the demand for natural gas will decrease accordingly.
Mian Zahid Hussain noted that efforts have been made to privatize electricity distribution companies for the past several decades, but there has been no success because, firstly, their size and losses were very high, and secondly, the employees were against privatization.
There was a monopoly of these companies in the country, due to which there was a lot of incompetence and corruption in them. The only solution to these problems was to involve the private sector in this sector by providing specific areas for electricity supply.
In this way, the private sector will enter the electricity market, and an era of competition will begin, which will reduce inefficiency and corruption and provide better service and affordable electricity to consumers.
