80% certain gas won't be available in Pakistan by next year: Asim

Former petroleum minister says no progress made to overcome shortage in the past

KARACHI:

Former federal minister for petroleum Dr Asim Hussain has said that he is 80 per cent certain that natural gas would not be available in Pakistan by next year.

"I predicted in 2012 that there would be no gas in the next 10 years if the policy was not implemented, and the same thing happened as I predicted, so now I'm 80% certain that there won't be gas starting next year," the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader said while talking to the media representatives outside the accountability court on Friday.

Asim said that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif announced that the cost of energy overall is $27 billion a year. "How we are going to pay this much? There were almost four billion BCF (billion cubic feet) of natural gas available when I left the ministry, and there are now almost 2.5 billion BCF; if it loses another billion, the remaining funds won't be enough," he warned.

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He said that the country and people require energy, adding that no progress has been made in this regard in the past and feared that no progress would be made in the future as well.

"If it (cost) increases from $27 billion to five to 10 billion more, I think the country would have a severe financial crisis in the future," he further said.