NEPRA, power ministry fail to agree on amendments to regulations

Ministry says new powers have been added for the regulator in the proposals

ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Water and Power and the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) have failed to reach common ground on the proposed amendments to the Regulation of Generation, Transmission and Distribution of Electric Power Act 1997.

A senior official of Nepra, the power sector regulator, while talking to journalists on Monday, said the federal government had not shared proposed changes to the Nepra Act for its comments and input and these were also not cleared by the inter-provincial Council of Common Interests (CCI).



He pointed out that the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government had written a protest letter to the centre, saying the CCI had not cleared such changes and these should be withdrawn.

However, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Water and Power, while defending the federal government’s move to incorporate the amendments, said the CCI’s decision had been misinterpreted.

The CCI did not drop the agenda related to amendments in the Regulation of Generation, Transmission and Distribution of Electric Power Act 1997 in its last meeting, the spokesperson said.

“There was no protest letter from any provincial government and it is a totally baseless notion. In fact, the provincial governments’ point of views on the proposed amendments were conveyed and duly incorporated.” The spokesperson said the CCI in its meeting decided that a meeting of all the federating units and federal government’s ministries concerned should be held immediately to finalise the amendments so that a final draft could be submitted to parliament for due process.

Later, a meeting of all the provinces and federal government was held under the chairmanship of Federal Minister for Water and Power Khawaja Muhammad Asif.

The meeting, after taking in-depth stock of the proposed amendments, approved them with necessary modifications. A press release in this regard was also issued.

However, the spokesperson said, some officials told the media that the CCI had dropped the agenda item and no decision was taken. The meeting of the chief ministers was followed by a series of consultative meetings between the provinces and the federal government.

The draft bill has to go through the prescribed process under the existing parliamentary set-up. It would not have been accepted, had it not been approved by the CCI. The spokesperson said new powers had been added in the draft amendments for the regulator in order to have an effective control of the sector and no existing powers had been curtailed or removed. The amendments are also aimed at bringing qualified and relevant person to the regulator with rich power sector background and experience.



According to the spokesperson, the proposed amendments are aimed at substantially strengthening the regulator and have been sent to parliament after comprehensive deliberations spanning over a year with the regulator, the provincial governments, international legal experts and international assistant partners.

“The regulator itself will be the greatest beneficiary of these amendments, which will give it strong powers of investigation, penalty and development of independent regulations not requiring any approval of the federal government.”

Published in The Express Tribune, June 21^st, 2017.

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