‘Power crisis due to govt’s incompetence’

National Assembly Leader of Opposition Shehbaz Sharif has rejected the PTI government's claim that the ongoing power crisis is caused by the policies of the last PML-N government and said the recent load-shedding is a glaring proof of the government's incompetence and mismanagement.

“The PTI [government] falsely blames the PML-N for setting up too many power plants. This extensive load shedding today gives a lie to these baseless accusations.

“And it is a fact that the PTI government is setting up more solar, wind and gas-fired plants, so the accusation of having more than necessary power plants is just false and laughable,” Shehbaz said in a statement issued on Saturday.

Shehbaz, who is also the PML-N’s president, said the PTI also “lies” when it says the plants set up by the PML-N were expensive. “This government hasn’t been able to produce one example of a power plant set up anywhere in the world that is cheaper [than those set up by the PML-N].”

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He reiterated that the PML-N’s last government saved over Rs200 billion while setting up three Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG)-fired power plants and challenged the government to find one example of a more efficient or cheaper plant anywhere in the world.

“The PTI lies when it says that the PML-N didn’t set up enough transmission lines. That is simply not true. The PTI cannot name one power plant that cannot be fully evacuated due to transmission shortage. Not one plant.

“In 2019, this incompetent government was able to transmit over 23,000MW and in 2020 in was able to transmit over 25,000MW using generation and transmission capabilities set up by the PML-N.”

He said all the LNG terminals that the country has were set up by the PML-N.

“The only transnational LNG pipeline was also installed by the PML-N and cheaper LNG was brought to the country through long term deals made by the PML-N,” he added.

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He said the PTI has so far failed to buy a single LNG cargo on a long term contract and it is buying some of the most expensive LNG in the world on short term contracts.

“Moreover due to its corruption and greed to use furnace oil and diesel, it refused to buy LNG on long term contracts at historically cheaper rates during the Covid crisis or convert our existing long term contracts to cheaper rates. Today, the PTI is paying three times the price for the same LNG.

“For each short term cargo that we buy for $12 per mmbtu instead of $4 per mmbtu, we are paying $24m extra per cargo and for long term cargo that we failed to convert, we are paying $12m extra. This Pakistan today is paying $216m every month due to PTI’s corruption and incompetence.”

He said load shedding had ended in Pakistan after 5 years of consistent efforts and hard work by the PML-N “under the visionary leadership of [former premier] Mian Nawaz Sharif”.

“Yet after three years of gross mismanagement and corruption, the PTI government has brought back debilitating power and gas load shedding to Pakistan.”

“This has to be the most glaring example of incompetence even by the PTI’s own standards.”

The PML-N leader pointed out that furnace oil is a fuel that the PTI government and federal ministers love to use as it produces electricity that is twice as expensive than the power produced through natural gas or LNG.

“Yet even the furnace oil that the PTI is buying is the most expensive in the world. It is paying over Rs30,000 per ton more for imported furnace oil.

He reminded that the PML-N also set up coal-fired plants that today produce cheaper thermal energy in Pakistan. “No power plant ever set up in Pakistan produces cheaper power than the coal-fired plant set up by the PML-N.”

Shehbaz said the entire value chain of the power and petroleum supply has been mismanaged by the PTI government’s “corruption and incompetence”. The resultant load shedding is causing untold misery to Pakistanis and losses of billions of rupees to businesses,” he concluded.