Power generation: PM asks provinces to take steps

ZAHEER ABBASI

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani has asked the provinces to take measures towards electricity generation.

Talking to media persons here on Thursday, Gilani said all the resources would be mobilized to solve the problem of loadshedding.  He said there were no restrictions on provinces to take up electricity generation projects. Without mentioning the name of any province, he said that decisions taken at the energy conference especially for two weekly holidays were not implemented by a particular province. That step would have reduced load shedding in the country and a provincial government would no longer have the loadshedding issue to launch agitation against the federal government.

In reply to a question about the creation of Seraiki province, he said that the creation of Seraiki provinces is the desire of 40 million people of the area. Gilani said the government was moving in the right direction on the issue of Seraiki province and resolutions from the National Assembly and Punjab Assembly had been passed in this regard. The Prime Minister said that some forces were trying to remove him from the office before “Janoobi” was created.

Replying to another question about his plan to file an appeal against Supreme Court decision in contempt of court case, the Prime Minister said that his legal team would soon take a decision in this regard.  Gilani said it was not the responsibility of the PML-N to get the SC decision implemented.  Gilani hoped that the leader of opposition in the National Assembly, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan who had refused to engage with him in a consultation process for the appointment of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) would gradually accept him as Prime Minister as he had accepted the committee constituted by him (the PM) for the finalisation of the nomination of appointment of the next CEC and the election of Syed Khurshid Shah as the chairman of that Committee.

The Prime Minister said President Asif Ali Zardari, who received an unconditional invitation, would be attending Nato’s Chicago Conference on Afghanistan. About resumption of Nato supply route, he said that negotiations were going on with the US.