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Power crisis: Federal cabinet approves two-day weekend
Two off-days will be implemented from October 15 if the CCI approves the decision.
320MW plant gifted by UAE plant is being installed in Faisalabad which will help ease electricity shortage in industrial areas of the city. PHOTO: Express/FILE
ISLAMABAD: The federal cabinet has approved two days holiday a week for those industries completely dependent on electricity and gas, Express 24/7 reported Wednesday.
The decision was taken by the federal cabinet in response to the ongoing, crippling countrywide power crisis.
The content of the decision will later be announced by the Federal Information and Broadcasting Minister Firdous Ashiq Awan in a press conference.
The proposal for this move will be forwarded to Council of Common Interest (CCI) for a final approval. The CCI’s approval is necessary to take the Punjab on board, as a large number of industrialists who will be affected by the two-day weekend belong to the province.
Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif will attend the CCI session where the final decision will be taken.
Prime Minister House sources said that Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani is due to summon a session of the CCI in a couple of days in which the premier will invite members of the CCI to discuss implementing the decision. However, the Karachi business community has already rejected the decision.
The decision will be implemented from October 15 and will be applicable to banks also.
Earlier, protesting against the government’s inaction over the ongoing power crisis, parliamentarians, led by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), staged a protest and sit-in on Thursday in front of the presidency.
Demonstrations in different parts of the country were also held in order to protest against prolonged load shedding across the country.
Earlier in May, the government had decided to table an energy saving plan comprising two holidays a week, closure of shops at 8 pm, advancing clocks by one hour and turning off street lights at night.
Opposition to the decision
Express 24 /7 reported that the provincial governments of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab have showed reluctance towards implementation of the decision taken by the federal cabinet about the two-day weekend.
Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif said that his government was not consulted regarding the implementation of the decision and hence, the province is not bound to following the decision.
Law Minister Rana Sanaullah also said that the Punjab government does not support the decision and the provincial government has already given its opinion in this regard.
Awami National Party (ANP) leader Haji Adeel stated that two holidays will not help in the conservation of energy and the markets should remain open till 10pm, while Mian Iftikhar Hussain from ANP said that the K-P government will endorse the CCI decision.
Meanwhile President of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KPCCI) Afan Aziz also criticised the decision of a two-day weekend.
He said the decision will not help in curbing the energy crisis and will impact the business community and day to day trading activities quite severely, adding that a two-day weekend had been practiced earlier as well to conserve energy, which had affected business.
Aziz questioned the effectiveness of this decision saying that if it is implemented then there shouldn’t be load shedding during the weekend, when presumably there is excess electricity, but since it cannot be stored, the policy fails to meet its purpose.
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Govt Should approve 2 Holidays, Not for saving energy BUT FOR IMPROVING SOCIAL LIFE OF PPL..WHICH WILL RESULT IN INCREASE IN OVER ALL EFFICENCY
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@Salman Nisar: Excuse me !!! u want more holidays just to improve social life ???? r u not aware that 2 day holiday will hurt our already fragile economy as industries and offices will be close ! And also this wont make a huge difference to the electricity crises !!!
OVERALL USELESS DECISION
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this should be applied to all Pvt. office as well.
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Wow. Congratulations. Very soon it will be revised to 3,4,5 days and then poeple will be free to enjoy their lives. It seems pakistan is the only country in the world which is well on its way to the stone age albeit without being bombed.
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Good… Its applicable for banks also! Its great to have two days off.. 5 days for work and 2 days for family and freinds…
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Yay !!! Youhooo!!!
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Day Light Saving, Two Days Holidays, CNGs, Leds, UPSs, Generators. We are a mislead nation.
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GEO NEWS
“In an effort to deal with the crisis the federal cabinet will seek approval of two weekly holidays from the council of common interest however main branches of banks will be exempemted.”
If the banks are not included than there is no sense of giving two holidays. Banks open means the entire economy is open.
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what abt friday?
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Winter is started already 50% energy will save and by two days holiday a week we save almost 75% ….(including load shedding) ok fine.I hope in 2012 summer no load shedding across the country. Good decision for 2012 SUMMER. by our federal cabinet.
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This should not be done, as two off days a week may cause increase in population. and Pakistan is already over-populated.
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Long weekends are good for the countries where they have honest work ethics, culture, punctuality and hourly output standards. In Pakistan we take Friday an off day anyway on the pretext of Prayers. Please think of the productivity needed by us.
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Why the Government is not focusing on Power Generation?
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So the best the Pak Govt could come up to tackle the power crisis is a two day weekend. Great work! On one side is Dr Firdous Awan who is worried about ‘multiplication of population’ due ot 2 off days( come to Australia Dr sahiba) and on the other side is our super smart government who thinks it’s necessary to have 2 days off for tackling power crisis. Why not have only 2 working days so we can get rid of this mess for once and all?
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we should only open up on saturdays and sundays the rest of the week should be off!
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Most modern economies have a 2day wknd! We should as well. The extra day off is more than compensated for by increased productivity on the remaining days
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@happyhappy: “This should not be done, as two off days a week may cause increase in population. and Pakistan is already over-populated.”
Dont worry about population, happyhappy. Our Militant Assets work 24×7, with power or without, curb the population. This is supposed to be a sarcastic joke but unfortunately a reality.
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The power problem can be solved once and for all if Pakistan declares a 3-day working week for factories, business and the government. That way, the citizens can enjoy for 4 days and everybody is happy.
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hi
is this 2day off applicable for govt hospitals as well?
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@Khalid javed… You are right.. But its applicable only to modern economies and not for stone age economies…
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Two days weekend will save energy, yes.
1) very good decision for public offices.
2) Govt should control the per SQUARE METER lights installed in the offices and specially in the shops. We observe that a small shop of 10X10 has installed 20+ lights??? my GOD no doubt these traders can pay as they transfer it on General public but the General Public have to pay DOUBLE cost for their extravagant lighting, firstly they charge in the prices and secondly, public pays bill raising and thirdly general public faces the loadshedding.
Why Govt is not taking action against such usage of electricity?
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tell me either its implement on banks or not?
well two leaves are good for save energy crises thanks.
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And as per Firdos Aashiq Awaan two-day weekend resulted in over-population…lol
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Those who are not in favor of govt decision of two days off in lives in fools paradise, this would not have happened if our nation had behave like true disciplined nation. We open markets at 12 o’ clock and there is no closing time beside country has no dams, no power , no CNG. We waste sunlight whole day and blame govt, this is not fair. Whole world gives off for two days to offices except shopping malls hospitals etc. good decision of govt
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How the productivity of the economy will improve by working six days when there is no power to run machines? More power generation is the solution and in its absence it does not make any difference to work 5 or 6 days a week? I believe even 3 days a week work will give you same result as 6 days in the absence of required power for industry and business.
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Wait a sec, you mean you have a 6-day week in Pakistan? Thats insane.
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last year five-day week system adopted by the government hasd saved millions of rupees in fuel and energy costs, besides enhancing efficiency and improving social life of the people. Almost all developed nations have their five-day week in their routine schedule. It is also one the indices of moving towards right path. On one hand Punjab government instigate people for riots in country over the issue of power failure, while on the other hand CM shahbaz and his party are opposing this power saving decision. People of punjab will scrap PML-N if they hell bent on to adopt anti-people policies.
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we have not progressed with one day week end and 45 hours/week for most of the 63 years since independence, while the west has with two day week end and 40 hours/week.
issue is not how long the week end should be, issue is that the poor quality of performance and bad governance will continue to keep us in poor state even if we work 24/7.
i agree that two day week end is necessary for long term health of workers.
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@faizan SBP off means all banks off…
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This is an absurd decision. At this rate, pretty soon we will be having 3, 4, 5, 6 days off to conserve energy. Rather than producing more energy, we are choosing to shut businesses down for two days, so our productivity goes down further. We are headed for stone ages without even trying..Recommend
one may say this bad for Industrialists and big traders who keep there own interest dear, they start hoarding in even month of holy Ramzan , they have no interest in issues of poor masses , this act of govt is a sigh of relief or those who don’t have generators, poor students studying in dark because there houses are not equipped with UPS…but when whole nation is lying in dark, this in unfair to safeguard the interest of few, two days off will save lot of energy …
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@PEACE:
Having spent the last eight years wasting my day at the office on Saturday i must disagree with you.
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This is like giving cough syrup to a TB patient and telling him ‘ Don’t worry you’ll be fine ‘.
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2 days off to save electricity would in turn result in gas crises as people obviously wont be sitting home on weekends!!! what would government then do to resolve that issue??
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@MAD
Last time they imposed two-day weekend, goods worth millions of dollars were stuck in Karachi port causing big loss for exporters.
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Whole world,s economies have a 2day weekend! We should as well. The extra day off is more than compensated for by increased productivity on the remaining days in terms of working hours as well and beieve me being in govt officer , 3 hrs ov friday and on saturday too no work is done , atleast we,ll have an 8 hr working day on friday now , efficiency , perfomance and social life will imrpove and also CNG , fuel and electricity will be saved.Well done Govt
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@Khalid Ahmed:
Newsflash. there are still goods stuck at the port causing a loss of millions of dollars despite there being a six day work week. the idea is that those that need to stay open on saturdays should stay open and the rest should be closed. Thats the way much of the world works.
Oh and most of the world does manage to get all its work don despite a five day workweek. The problem isnt with the two day weekend its in our processes, our natural lethargic tendencies and above all our minds.
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It is enjoyable to learn of two days weekly off. Off course it is a decision of public regime but bureaucracy will not implement it in letter and spirit because they force to their staff to appear on weekly holidays. If any office opens on the weekend then there will be non to save energy.
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Off-course it is a good decision, not only in the pretext of energy conservation but for human exhaustion also. In most of the developed and developing country they have pre set work hours (i.e. max 40 hours a week) a 5 day work week. But in Pakistan we have six days i.e. min 48 to 50 hours. No time to relax our body and soul. The other thing that is of more importance is the Government offices; where most of the employees snooz on saturdays. For this they have to travel towards offices- consume fuel,attend offices – consume electricity, and this purposeless. Further, in most of the countries markets open at 9Oclock and clsoe by 8Oclock or 9Oclock. People go to the markets for shoipping in these hours and benefit from day light rather like pakistanis in the evenings…… In Karachi no one will see a market opened before 12 Noon.
Hats-off to the decision.
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@MAD:
Not only this, but the major problem in our country is the so called capitalist minds, the industrialist who have never transfered any of the profits to their employees. who have never thought of social welfare of the employees. How can they forsake thier earnings for the sake of a little peacwe of mind to thier workers. The Government should also bound these industrialists to pay for the saturdays to thier employees and accept it as a holiday……
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well it is a very good decision n it should have beeen taken in may … two hoildays is very common all around the world even in UAE even they import all the things n export oil
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