The new government has bowed to a very powerful lobby, APTMA.
FAISALABAD: Over the five years that the PPP government was in power, we industrialists of Punjab were severely discriminated against — thanks in large part to a patently unjust allocation of energy by the federal government. However, we expected that the new government would reconsider this policy and set things right. So far, this has not materialised.
In fact, what the new government has done is that it has seemingly bowed to a very powerful lobby, in the form of the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA), by allowing the mill-owners who are members of the association SNGPL, to produce their own electricity. Under this arrangement, their mills are not going to be affected by the region’s chronic power outages. All that the owners of other industries and factories are asking for is a level playing field: i.e., the same concessions granted to APTMA should also be given to other industries, so that they too can grow.
The new government has allowed a special quota for this particular industry to use gas to generate its own electricity from in-house power plants. It is important to mention that the thermal power plants operated by these companies operate on a mere 25 per cent thermal efficiency and gas is being allocated to them.
At the same time, generation companies and independent power producers who operate at a 50-55 per cent thermal efficiency are not able to operate only because of lack of gas. Why has the new government given this concession only to APTMA?
We do not expect any favours from the government, we just want a level playing field so that the most efficient industries survive.
A concerned business owner
Published in The Express Tribune, August 12th, 2013.
Like Opinion & Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.
