In order to alleviate the back-breaking burden of power bills, former foreign minister and founder of Awam Pakistan Party (APP) Miftah Ismail has advised the government to withdraw sales and advanced income tax from the bill for three months.
Addressing a presser in Karachi, Miftah Ismail suggested that the withdrawal of the taxes from July to September will reduce the amount of the electricity bills by 24 percent.
He also recommended the government reduce its expenditures, adding that the inflationary bills were not only causing a political instability in the country, but also creating a huge gulf between the people and the PML-N. He advised the rulers to render some sacrifices as they asked people for the same.
Miftah said that the government should cut out the Rs400 billion to Rs500 billion spend on members of the national and provincial assemblies and decrease the PSDP spending by Rs50 billion.
The former foreign minister made another recommendation to reduce the power tariff, saying the tax should be reduced on LNG-based plants owned by the government. He suggested that the tax be abolished on the fuel of those plants running on the power plants grid.
Miftah said the high tariff power bills are causing the political instability in the country, adding the country's economy will face a big blow if the country makes the sovereign default with the Chinese IPPs.
He lamented that the middle-class consumers were bearing the cost of line losses and electricity theft.
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