Archive for category Basic Needs
Now others have to tell Pakistan to solve our own problems
Posted by K. Shahzad in Basic Needs on May 28, 2011
It is unfortunate but it is true that the current political party of Pakistan in power called Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) have lived up to its reputation of incompetency in every trait of life, other than identifying and rectifying the problems which their country is facing, they lately seem to be causing the situations where others seem to telling us what our problems are and how we have to solve them.
One such situation came forward when recently US secretary of state Hillary Clinton visited Pakistan and in one of her public speeches she said and I quote
United State can not and should not solve the problems of Pakistan, Pakistan have to identify their own problems and have to take though decisions to resolve them.
What a shame for a so called democratic government of a country that someone from thousands of Kilometers away have to come and tell the political leadership about the problems of their country and have to urge them to take solid actions to resolve them.
Irony is the problems that Hillary had to point out were not limited to the coping with terrorists which may be hiding in the country but the issues she raised also involved the poverty, power shortages, law ‘n’ order and much more.
Now if the Zardari administration of country would have been doing some solid work on these issues, they would definitely have come up with solid response to these statements but nothing just came from the government on this.
By the way nothing comes from this government as form of response from this government unlike some few governments of Pakistan in past. I remember the time of Pervez Musharraf in power, despite the fact that he was some one called military dictator, each time when the country was in some kind serious situation or hard times, we have always heard special addresses to the nation from the him explaining the situation and the way forward along it.
Even in the power period of PML-N we have witnessed some of these speeches in hard times, directed specifically to people of Pakistan where I remember the former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had explained the situations and explained the next step to go forward.
But the point is now there is no such thing like taking the people of Pakistan in confidence in the agenda of current government. The Zardari administration seems to be totally indifferent of issues which are faced by people of Pakistan. Either it is the issue of terrorism, electricity shortages, gas shortages, daily used commodities’ shortages, ever growing inflation rates, terror events or even the events like US violating Pakistan’s territory to take care of Osama Bin Laden without even notifying Pakistan, government will just not speak out, will not just address the nation to let them know what is the plan to go forward.
By the way apparently there have not been a plan, because if there was, the country’s half problems would have been solved by now considering Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) have just completed their three years in the country.
As a proud citizen of country Pakistan and on behalf 180 million other resident souls I can safely say, we have nothing to do with politics all we want is “the political parties who are in power should deliver, whatever they are suppose to deliver; other than just being indifferent of people’s problems” and watch it because the day is not far when people of Pakistan will wake up from that sleep or ignorance and you may not have a second chance.
What described above was a personal opinion and compensates for the feelings of millions of other Pakistanis, let us know via comments if you support or differ with whatever presented above.
No more subsidies on petroleum prices, major price hikes are in place in Pakistan
Posted by K. Shahzad in Basic Needs on May 1, 2011
Another petroleum prices hike was took in place on Saturday in Pakistan to keep up with the price hike going on in the International market. According to government these price hikes were to keep up with International market and they can not provide any subsidies to people any more. I doubt that they were providing any subsidies to people in recent past.
This is second major hike in petroleum prices in time period of just few days. As soon as this price hike came in place the price to diesel approaches to the Rs 100 mark with its current price of 97.31 from old price of 92.89 which was set few days ago after a previous raise in price. The Light deisal price was took up Rs. 9.32 making it cost 88.30 per litter to the consumers. Kerosene oil is now costing Rs. 89.70 with price hike of 5.60. Petrol price also headed to the 88.41 with the increase of Rs. 4.85
While the current political party in power (PPP) prepares its reasons for this hike in prices as we know that one factor of this impact of local petroleum prices is continuous deterioration of Pakistani currency against US dollar and other International currencies. This deterioration only picked speed after current political party in power Pakistan Peoples’s Party (PPP) came into power. The Pakistani currency declined in just first six months of power period of PPP was equal to the currency decline of more than 12 years before that.
So from start PPP have not been able to manage things well and impacted the economy real badly. Coming back to the current petroleum prices issue, when PPP talks of not being able to giving any subsidies on petroleum prices on same time they have in-effect taxes on products. GST is already being taken on all products adding a good amount to price and also another charge called petroleum levy is also in place, which further worsens the prices.
Government which is already charging the taxes on a product can it say they are no more able to provide subsidies. In terms of overall development of country if these and other taxes would have been being put in some good use, the people of Pakistan would have been much more happy and comfortable with that. But no development anywhere near that level of collections is being done. Situation with Electricity and Gas shortages is being worsen and economy is doing no good.
Another type of fuel which costs less called Compress Natural Gas (CNG) is also facing the shortage in this country only because of the defective policy of government of Pakistan.
Prices on all kind of commodities like Petroleum products and Electricity being raised blindly, directly impacting the production and transportation costs of every thing else. These blind hikes in the prices will play their part in further worsening the economy.
Electicity load shedding in Pakistan intensifies in summer 2011
Posted by K. Shahzad in Basic Needs on April 26, 2011
Summer 2011 is just starting and electricity load shedding in Pakistan already started to intensify. Power load shedding of 12 hours is already in place in many areas of country, PEPCO claimed that electricity short fall is 2500 Mega Watts (MW) already. We are just into April, May at the moment as we head towards the more hotter months of summer like June, July and August the electricity shortfall is going to reach 6000 MW or even above. Real long hours of load shedding is expected in coming months.
Already we are experiencing the worst load shedding of history of Pakistan, now question comes in mind “who is responsible for all of this?”. Before we conclude lets have a look on some facts related to the issue.
Its a known fact that along with house hold consumers the Industry of Pakistan is effected badly due to load shedding. Putting the production of very much critical goods in jeopardy. But the DG PEPCO (Pakistan Electric Power Company) while talking to a private TV channel evening talk show on 25th of April denied the fact that Load Shedding ever effected any Industry of Pakistan. Also he confirmed that load shedding will increase in coming days if supply of oil and gas is not restored to full required level.
DG PEPCO also said we need to put more load on consumer, only that way we can get around the issue of load shedding. According to him they are giving Rs. 2 plus subsidy to people and need to finish it and bring price to more than 9 Rs per unit from current 7.05 for house hold consumers. Also DG PEPCO blamed on the line losses and few defaulters the cause of load shedding. While it was discussed that President house is one of the defaulters of PEPCO, he tried to defend the ruling party (Pakistan Peoples Party).
If we look into this once again, not just a feeling but putting forward the fact like “who have to make sure oil is supplied to the PEPCO” also “who have to make sure the support of gas to PEPCO” and also “who have to facilitate the PEPCO to look forward into alternate/clean energy sources like Thermal/Solar energy”, the only entity responsible for all of this is Government of Pakistan.
The party in power which calls it self the “Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) ” seems to do nothing. Either its provision of Oil and gas to the PEPCO or the future planning and thinking about opting the alternate energy sources like Thermal and Solar energy, this party is doing nothing but is just silent spectator of bad situation of People of Pakistan. BTW PPP seems to do nothing on any of project which interests people of Pakistan.
According the to PEPCO they can’t give any time line when they will be able to cope with the issue of electricity, in fact they are not sure even it will ever happen. Rightly so, when the party in power is not concerned about condition of people and doing nothing on its end, then Newton’s first law comes in, telling us, some one have got to do this, this will never happen itself.
Chances of current party in Power (PPP) being elected in next elections are slim looking at the situation Pakistan have been in their power period, and they better be, as we need people in power who really work for the country and not just come up with lame promises.
If you are any official of PPP reading this post time, you are still holding all the cards, you would want to be elected in next election (won’t you?), well if yes, you better do it and better do it fast, for your own self, for your own coming generations and for your country.
Long live Pakistan and may Allah solve the problems of this great nation called “Pakistanis”.
CNG stations strike in Punjab continues for indefinite period
Posted by K. Shahzad in Basic Needs on April 14, 2011
April 2011 a strike was called by the president of CNG association and came into affect from 13th of April 2011. The reason for CNG stations to go on strike was insufficient supply of gas from SUI Northern Gas Company Limited. This insufficient supply of gas from SUI Northern Gas Company is shocking because we are into the season where gas consumption is lowest of the years. As most of house hold consumption like Room and Water heaters go down in this season, so that provides considerable decrease in daily gas usage.
The winter season is long gone but Sui Northern Gas is still observing some lame Gas Load management plan or Gas Load shedding in other words. Load shedding is mostly being observed in Punjab and its two days a week. Gas load Management plan is not only a big dent on CNG stations’ businesses but a headache for consumers due to the prices of alternate fuel being very high relatively. Plus also gas is not available for two days and two to three days of remaining five days consumers have to face long queues when they are all on the road to refuel their vehicles for usage in off days of CNG availability.
In the summer season when temperatures are already touching and exceeding the 40 degrees Cecilius, this is strange that Sui Northern Gas company is facing gas short fall. It is not only the case in Punjab, this company is struggling in other regions too, like in Sindh same company is not providing sufficient gas to KESC triggering the electricity load shedding of up to 14 hours.
Current political party in government should know its role and should do what ever they can to resolve these daily life necessity issues but sorry to say our leaders still are just sleeping and are indifferent about the problems of people of Pakistan.
Update: In day time very few CNG Stations remained open, they had the long queues but were giving gas of limited volume e.g. just 100 Rs or so. However in night little more number of CNG stations were open for business, but still there were unbearably long queues at those CNG stations.
Do give your thoughts, opinion or more info in the comments section below.
CNG load shedding becomes real pain, Potohar region CNG stations flooded with vehicles
Posted by K. Shahzad in Basic Needs on December 30, 2010
When it comes to CNG stations, Potohar region includes the Islamabad, Rawalpindi, areas from Attock to Jehlum and some other adjustment areas. According to government’s lame CNG load management plan on Fridays and Saturdays the CNG stations remain close in this region. Due to this the CNG pumps were kept flooded with vehicles today and specially this evening. So in cold weather when the gas in homes was available with low pressure, ‘getting CNG for vehicles’ was also made very difficult.
So technically along with two CNG load shedding days getting the gas for the vehicle on the day before and day after are also very much difficult and waiting in long queues is mandatory for that. This means in Punjab only three days the CNG is easily available.
This is another story of failure of current administration as this gas shortage issue is now there from several months and a permanent solution for this is long due. Current party in power thinks the load shedding is only solution for shortage of any commodities like power and gas.



