pakistan

Minister of Petroleum Mossadegh Malik announced the good news to the people about the cheaper electricity in the coming days.

During an interview in a private channel program, he claimed that the government has decided to bear the additional burden of electricity for 86 percent of the houses and for this, 50 billion rupees will be withdrawn from the treasury and given to the electricity department.

Apart from this, Mossadegh Malik also spoke about electricity distribution companies. He hoped that negotiations with Jamaat-e-Islami on the issue of IPPs would be fruitful.

It should be noted that Jamaat-e-Islami’s sit-in on the issue of over-billing and termination of expensive contracts with IPPs has entered the 5th day in Rawalpindi, while all negotiations with the government have failed.

It should be noted that there is strong protest and anger from all quarters on the amount paid to IPPs in the country and the expensive contracts with them.

Earlier, former Federal Commerce Minister Gohra Ijaz, after asking for the record of payments made to the electricity distribution companies (IPPs), said to read the contracts of the IPPs and also know their details, in the name of mismanagement and corruption. But due to the loss of investor confidence, we are being robbed.

Earlier Gohar Ejaz had asked Federal Minister for Power Awais Laghari for the record of payments made to IPPs. He had demanded in the press release that the data of all 106 IPPs should be made public and the nation should be told that which power plant has generated how much electricity according to its capacity.

Power division officials, on the other hand, said that the government cannot unilaterally walk away from agreements based on sovereign guarantees with IPPs, as this could expose the government to heavy fines in arbitral tribunals, as in the Rekodic case. .

ISLAMABAD: The Power Division has reportedly started work on removing 23 faults identified in power generation, transmission and distribution in the country.

The proposed reforms have also been shared with the Prime Minister and the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC), Business Record reports.

Sources said that the Power Division has identified four factors related to the power generation process which include substitution of imported fuel, optimum utilization of fuel and capacity, reduction of capacity payment burden and privatization.

Against this backdrop, the main issue that has concerned the authorities is the power sector’s unmanageable revolving debt of over Rs 2.4 trillion, which the government says is an unpayable liability, which cannot be recovered.

Electricity companies have prepared to collect additional tax from the public on their income

Secretary Power Rashid Mahmood Langriyal said that circular debt is unpaid dues, of which only 100 billion rupees are circular, the rest are dues. No money will be charged. If it was circular, some amount could have been refunded.

During the fiscal year 2023-24, the revolving credit has been increased by about Rs 100 billion despite the fact that the government had promised the IMF and the World Bank that the revolving credit would be Rs 2.310 trillion.

Sources said the problems identified in the distribution system are high losses, inefficiencies and high tariff and tax reforms. The Power Division is expected to share its review of the plan with the Senate Standing Committee on Power on August 6, 2024. The import fuel substitution strategy includes adding 2,400 MW of solar generation, replacing imported coal power plants and using auxiliary electricity for mining.

Electricity is going to be cheaper in the coming days, the big claim of the Minister of Petroleum

For tariff reforms and tax reforms, the Power Division is working on reduction of industrial cross-subsidies, provision of subsidies to protected domestic consumers through social security programmes, tariff restructuring and tax restructuring.

Power Minister Owais Laghari had requested Senate Standing Committee Chairman Mohsin Aziz to allow the Power Division to make a presentation on the fault lines of the power sector and measures being considered for improvement.

The minister argued that the government is not in favor of buying and selling power itself and wants to enable a competitive commercial bilateral contract market. Nepra is also ready for a public hearing on it.