ISLAMABAD: Power Minister Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari hinted at reviewing electricity rates for solar, industrial, and tribal region consumers on Thursday in an attempt to reverse rising capacity payments and revive plunging electricity demand. Leghari conceded that distribution companies regularly overbill customers and that the power division was completely unaware of the extent of defective meters.
During a press conference, Mr. Leghari further claimed that the executives and employees of his ministry and its subsidiaries, in addition to energy thieves, were responsible for an estimated Rs560 billion in losses each year. He pledged to put an end to this threat, which was breaking the bank and hurting the country’s economy beyond repair.
According to the minister, the distribution companies were losing Rs. 200 billion because of energy units they were billing but were unable to collect, and another Rs. 360 billion was lost due to theft made possible by “our officers and staff.” It’s not acceptable, he declared.
He declared that anyone under whose supervision such thefts and losses were discovered will face action from the government. Protests would not bring down the government. This is a crucial service, he added, adding that 20% of the employees and police contributed to those losses at the expense of regular customers.
He claimed that corrupt officials could not be replaced by new inductions because the government was being blackmailed. He emphasized, “There is no shortage of young engineers with the necessary credentials who can be trained to take over assignments.”
According to Mr. Leghari, employees of the Discos, ranging from linemen and meter-readers to executive engineers (XENs), sub-divisional engineers (SDOs), and superintending engineers (SEs), had until April 23 to survey their respective regions and areas of responsibility and remove kundas, or unlawful energy connections. The government would dispatch special teams and FIA representatives to take action against the workers if they didn’t comply.
He regretted that the number of malfunctioning meters was unknown to his ministry. Upon his investigation, he claimed that the power division had informed him that just 100,000 of the meters under Discos’ control were faulty. When he asked if all other meters in the nation were functioning properly, the response, he said, was “we don’t know.”
astronomical overbilling
The minister also acknowledged that overbilling in the Discos, both in the domestic and other sectors, was occurring on a monthly basis and totaled “crores of rupees.” He claimed that there was widespread overbilling in the agriculture sector as well. In this case, he added, families had switched from using tube wells to solar power and their transformers were sitting inactive, yet they were still receiving bills totaling millions of rupees.
Mr. Leghari’s stance differs from the one the power division previously adopted prior to his appointment as federal minister. Following a thorough investigation, the electrical distribution companies were accused of huge overbilling by the power regulator Nepra last year.
Nepra’s claims were refuted by the power division and the enterprises affiliated with it. The Power Division then established a “independent inquiry team” that verified Nepra’s conclusions as well, but they chose not to release the report to the public.
In order to curb power theft, overbilling, and circular debt, Mr. Leghari stated that a comprehensive roadmap for power sector changes had been formulated based on the prime minister’s directions and will be revealed to the public in a few weeks. The minister further stated that the circular debt currently stood at approximately Rs2.5 trillion and that bills totaling roughly Rs1.9 trillion were yet unpaid.
The government is considering rate reductions for industrial customers as well as other incentives to encourage higher power usage in response to the dropping demand for electricity, which is partially caused by the transition towards solar power.
As more and more customers go off the grid, the minister stated that just 700 MW of the 6,800 MW of solar panels that were imported this year were put into net-metering. Mr. Leghari stated, “We are seriously thinking about this.”
