Minister for Information and Broadcasting Senator Shibli Faraz and Minister for Energy Umar Ayub said that the present government was working on improvement of the power distribution system which remained neglected in the past. While explaining last night Electricity breakdown they said that 10 thousand megawatt power supply was in the grid and fault occurred at Guddu power plant which rapidly tripped all power houses. They also noted that the power sector was the backbone of the country but the previous government did not introduce any new technology to improve the distribution system.
The electricity load shedding emerged in 2009 and reached its worst situation in 2014, when the country faced an average short fall of 7600 MW. Although, elimination of load shedding was an agenda point of all political parties including PML (N) in the 2013 General Election.
However, China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) helps the government to invest heavily in the Energy sector. At that time, Pakistan was facing an acute problem of load shedding and it was an attractive avenue of investment for Chinese investors and the government, therefore several short and long term projects of hydroelectricity, coal, solar and wind energy was initiated as joint ventures by the two governments. About 22 projects of Electricity generation were planned including one project of electricity transmission from Mitiari to Lahore under CPEC. Most of the projects have been completed, few are in pipelines and the acute problem of load shedding was solved in 2018-2019. The Mitiari to Lahore transmission line was started in 2016 and scheduled to be completed in Mar 2021. The government spokespersons tried to earn the credit of the subject transmission line which was initiated by the previous government while accusing it for not doing anything.
We observed that although the memory of the masses is certainly weak but incumbent government should portray the facts. After two- and half-year rule, the government should enumerate its deliveries in various fields instead of accounting past for all illnesses. Although the government has taken a flashy action against few employees of NTDC, there is a need for a comprehensive probe into the issue to ascertain the facts. There was a continuous load shedding in various parts of the country during last summer.
It is suggested that the government should give due importance to electricity generation, distribution and related issues. During the PTI government, only the electricity problem in Karachi has been addressed up to some extent. Other than that the government did nothing except increase the electricity tariff. Hopefully, after this incident the government will take serious steps to resolve all energy issues including generation of cheap electricity and its safe distribution throughout the Country.
