Staff Reporter
Islamabad
Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Asad Umar on Thursday said the lack of a proper power transmission and distribution system in Karachi was the reason behind increased load shedding in the metropolis and promised that the federal government will improve it in “record time”.
Speaking on the floor of the National Assembly, Umar said the main reason behind a weak distribution and transmission system was the apathy of previous governments, including those led by the PPP and the PML-N.
The minister said “the work they [previous governments] did not do then is being done now”.
Umar said the opposition had termed the K-Electric chairperson as a “mafia”, adding that they were giving the impression that the power utility had been privatised during the PTI government.
“It was privatised during the PML-Q government. Then the PPP was in government for five years and Raja Pervaiz Ashraf was prime minister. [The PPP] should tell us why they let such a corrupt outfit run the company. Then PML-N came into power. We will ask Khawaja Asif who was the then energy minister why they did not take action for five years.”
The planning minister said his government was being told that the PPP could end load shedding within six months if the power utility was handed over to them.
Referring to the PPP’s government in Zulfikar Bhutto’s era, he recalled how there was no electricity in Karachi the entire night and they found out in the morning that there had been a coup and General Zia had taken over. “They have been involved in load-shedding for 35 years,” he said.
Explaining what he said was the reason behind excessive load shedding in Karachi, the minister said Karachi’s power needs kept increasing over time but previous governments did not take any step to either increase electricity production in Karachi or to create a system to import it from elsewhere in country.
“Power plants kept increasing throughout the country but Karachi could not take electricity from them because the transmission and distribution system to do that was not created.”
PPP’s Agha Rafiullah said that the federal government was supplying furnace oil, gas and even power from the national grid to KE but the people of Karachi were still suffering.
“The members of the ruling PTI have been staging protest sit-in outside the KE office. Whose government is it in the country?” he questioned, and added that “if any representative of a province in Nepra is not functioning properly, [the government should] sack him and take action against him.”
PPP member of the National Assembly Shamim Ara Panhwar claimed that the PPP could resolve the issue in six months, if KE was handed over to the party.
Former premier and PPP leader Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, speaking after Umar, said that the PTI government could not continue blaming previous governments for its own shortcomings. “When you give speeches instead of giving a specific answer, you always lay blame on previous governments.” He added that a newly formed government could blame its predecessor for a few months after coming into power but not forever.
Earlier, protests erupted in the National Assembly after a war of words ensued between lady PPP lawmakers and PTI members during Umar’s speech.
Women lawmakers from the PPP surrounded the speaker’s dais after Ayub and PTI lawmaker Aslam Khan allegedly used inappropriate words directed at them during the session.
The argument started when a call for attention notice was presented in the assembly by PPP over the unannounced load shedding in Karachi by KE. Protests started after a war of word ensued between Ayub and Khan against the women lawmakers of the House. The tensions showed no signs of stopping even after Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri urged the PTI lawmaker to not speak to women lawmakers this way.
