Kamal urges govt to cancel capacity payment accords with local IPPs
Pakistan
Capacity payment to IPPs aggravating country's economy
ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) – Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan senior leader Mustafa Kamal says Pakistan cannot progress under the current conditions of capacity payments, urging the government to scrap the accords with local independent power producers (IPPs).
Speaking to the media after visiting the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) office on Wednesday, he highlighted the rising energy costs as the biggest issue facing the country, noting that little effort had been made to alleviate the burden on the masses.
Kamal claimed that the country has a capability of 43,000MW, yet despite this massive potential, the issue of loadshedding has remained unresolved for many decades.
"The matter has been made worse with the rising power bills,” the former Karachi mayor added.
Regarding the IPPs, Kamal stated that a massive amount of public money is being spent with little return to the system, which has created problems for the overall state of the economy.
He said that the capacity payment agreements with local IPPs need to be abolished, as billions of rupees of taxpayer money have been wasted on this front.