PESHAWAR: Awami National Party leader Mian Iftikhar Hussain has said that micro hydel projects can help to overcome power crisis in at least 12 districts of the province if provincial government has political will and ability to resolve the issue.

Talking to Dawn about the recent violent protests against power outages, he said that the PTI government should not hide its inefficiency. He said that government should not side with those people, who damaged grid stations.

“Grid stations are public property. The people protesting against power outages should know the fault does not lie with the grid station but the provincial government,” said Mr Hussain. He termed the provincial government inefficient. He said that ANP workers were also protesting against power outages but they were not resorting to violence and destruction so media did not cover their protests.

“After passage of 18th Amendment, provincial government can launch micro hydel projects to resolve power crisis in at least 12 districts of the province,” said the ANP leader, who remained information minister during the previous provincial government.

Talking about the strategy of ANP government to deal with the issue, he said that first they tried to buy Peshawar Electric Supply Company but it was not possible so they tried to conduct some 24 feasibilities and found out that micro hydel projects could help to utilise the water resources for power generation and even distribution.

Mr Hussain said that about three projects were inaugurated in Malakand and Swat during the ANP government but the present government didn’t take the schemes further than just re-inaugurating the already inaugurated projects.

“Imran Khan had claimed to set up 360 dams and sell electricity one day but so far not a single district is self-sufficient in power generation,” he said.

Mr Hussain said that the worn out transmission lines, transformers and entire distribution system could not sustain the power and resulted in huge line losses.

“If Punjab government could upgrade its power lines and distribution system why Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government can’t do so? Our chief minister failed to attract Chinese investors during his visit to China recently,” he said.

Mr Hussain said that there was dire need to upgrade transmission lines and transformers. He said that it was the responsibility of federal government but provincial government could not gain much from encouraging its party workers, who were attacking grid stations.

Meanwhile, ANP senior vice president MNA Haji Ghulam Ahmad Bilour during a press conference warned the federal government of protests against unscheduled power outages in the province.

He said that people were experiencing power outages in the holy month of Ramazan which was unjust. He said that his party could not accept excessive electricity outages on pretext of power theft.

Mr Bilour asked Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif, Minister for Water and Power Khawaja Mohammad Asif and Wapda chairman to immediately end the prolonged unscheduled power loadshedding in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

He said that they would be left with no other option except protest if government didn’t ensure smooth supply of electricity during Ramazan. He said that he along with ANP provincial president Ameer Haider Khan Hoti, Mian Iftikhar Hussain and other leaders would lead the protest.

“We don’t want to take law into our own hands and attack government installations,” said Mr Bilour. He added that they only wanted to exercise their right to protest against excessive power outages.

“If provincial government doesn’t cooperate with federal government, then the Wapda installations should be protected by Rangers across the province,” he said.

Published in Dawn, June 1st, 2017