KARACHI, Jan 31: Privatization and Investment Minister Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh said on Monday that new management of Karachi Electric Supply Corporation (KESC) could not increase power tariff for seven years.

He was talking to reporters at the inauguration of third ECO seminar on "Trade and investment information networking in the ECO region" here. "The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) has fixed electricity tariff for KESC for seven years and nobody, either the government or the private party has the authority to raise these rates for at least seven years," the minister observed.

In reply to a question about the concerns of employees, Dr Hafeez said the government desired to take along the employees of privatized entities. "These concerns are baseless as none of the staffer is retrenched from 18 units which have been privatized during our tenure," he noted.

He said the bidding for KESC would be held on February 4, 2005 and the government wanted to complete this transaction in a "good way". -APP