Industries to go on strike on Wednesday

Government urged to intervene and resolve the long running issue of power outages.

KARACHI: Trade organisations in Karachi have called for strike on Wednesday (November 3) in response to the increased power outages in industrial areas of the city.

Officials of various trade bodies met on Saturday at the office of the Korangi Association of Trade and Industry (Kati) to discuss problems being faced by industrial units in the wake of daily 12-hour power outages.

“Officials of trade organisations have unanimously decided to go for strike on Wednesday,” said Johar Ali Qandhari, chairman of Kati. However, the decision could be revisited if the government steps in to help, he added. “We urge Prime Minister Gilani and Water and Power Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf to resolve the problem of power outages.”

However, SITE Association of Industry (SAI), one of the largest industrial zones of Pakistan, has not backed the strike call. Wahab Lakhani, chairman of SAI, confirmed that his association has not endorsed the strike call for Wednesday.

“We will not endorse Wednesday’s strike because the Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC) has earmarked November 4 to resume gas supply. We can give a strike call on November 5 if SSGC fails to resume supply,” said Lakhani.

The crisis of power outages started in industrial areas of the city following the shutdown of Zamzama gas field for maintenance.

SSGC informed the Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) that it would not be able to continue the gas pressure for a week and hence KESC resorted to increased outages and shifted power generation more on furnace oil, which increased the cost of power production up to three times.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 31^st, 2010.