Zardari, PM get down to tackling power crisis By Our Staff Reporter
Wednesday, 22 Jul, 2009 | 03:33 AM PST ISLAMABAD, July 21: President Asif Ali Zardari asked leading businessmen and industrialists on Tuesday to join hands with the government in finding a permanent solution to the problem of power shortage, while Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani constituted a cabinet committee to make a fresh study of the situation and formulate short- and long-term strategies to overcome the crisis.
“ Let the government and private entrepreneurs work together and take the bull by the horns,” the president said during a meeting with entrepreneurs, including Tariq Saigol, Mian Mohammad Mansha, Bashir Ali Mohammad, Arif Nizami and All Pakistan Textile Mills Association Chairman Tariq Mahmood.
He said that long hours of loadshedding in the high summer had tested people’s patience to its limits. The president said the government had already contracted rental power projects to meet immediate energy needs, but the problem needed some long-term and ‘out-of-box’ solutions. “And we have the political will to try them.”
Commerce Minister Makhdoom Amin Fahim, Industries Minister Manzoor Wattoo, Investment Minister Waqar Ahmed, Textiles Minister Rana Farooq Saeed, Water & Power
Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf, Secretary General Salman Faruqui and Adviser to the PM on Petroleum Dr Asim Hussain also attended the meeting.
The committee formed by the prime minister comprises ministers of water and power, defence, labour and privatisation, adviser on petroleum and the minister of state for finance. The committee will meet on Wednesday under the chairmanship of the prime minister.
After the meeting at the presidency, spokesperson Farhatullah Babar said the president had suggested some innovative solutions and invited the private sector to consider them.
The president suggested that a company be formed by energy investors which should offer shares to the general public to raise capital.
He said the government had already prepared feasibilities for dozens of small hydel projects which could be shared with energy producers.
Mr Babar quoted the president as saying that raising capital through stock exchanges by a conglomerate of private producers and the assistance provided by the government in the form of feasibility studies and required facilities could make it a successful model.
The entrepreneurs offered suggestions, ranging from circular debt to solar energy and hydel generation. The president advised them to meet the prime minister and discuss their suggestions.
Mr Babar said that after a meeting of private investors with the prime minister, the president would hold a meeting with the prime minister by the end of the week or early next week to consider some new solutions and review the ongoing projects aimed at adding another 3,000MW to the national grid by the end of the year.
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