The Ministry of Water and Power has stopped sharing information of electricity load shedding while restricting it to a close official circle in Islamabad, said the Pakistan Electric Power Company (Pepco) sources. The ministry was not sharing it with the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) on daily basis, they added. They have termed it a clear violation of the Access to the Information Act, 2013, saying that the ministry is not authorised to stop sharing information on load shedding with public.
It may be noted that the ministry was sharing information with the PEPCO as well earlier, which was further shared with the media houses through a regular text message on daily basis. But this exercise is no more in practice despite repeated protests by the media persons.
The power sector sources said the ministry has never refuted to media reports regarding over 10 hours daily load shedding in urban and around 16 hours a day load shedding in rural areas. "It is not less than an admission in the absence of an official rebuttal," they added.
Meanwhile, the industry circles have also criticised the ministry for the forced closure of power supply while making a false claim that there was no forced closure in the country. Right from the federal minister to the secretary water and power, everyone has misstated regarding the forced closure and the industrial units in Kasur circle of LESCO are yet exposed to it. "Also, the supply of low voltage electricity in the area is resulting in production losses and machinery failures," said one industrialist while requesting anonymity.
A source from the PEPCO explained that the system is supposed to observe load shedding of one hour on a shortfall of 700MW and the total shortfall crosses 5000MW per day simply if the city of Lahore is facing daily load shedding of seven to eight hours. It further said some 800,000 new customers, on an average, are added to the system every year, which triggers the demand in between 1000-12000MW per annum. "Since the installed capacity is almost same as it was five years earlier with a minor addition here and there therefore the urban areas are facing load shedding for eight to 10 hours and the rural areas between 15 to 18 hours daily," source said.