The challenge of electricity theft
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EDITORIAL: While it is not surprising that a lot of electricity is stolen, it is still shocking that that figure runs to the tune of Rs380 billion every year. But that’s not the only bomb that Power Division Secretary Rashid Mehmood Langrial dropped during his testimony before a National Assembly Standing Committee last Friday.
He went on to inform its members that “the impact of Rs520bn in stolen electricity is estimated to be passed onto consumers in bills from the next fiscal year”. And that Disco (distribution companies) employees were also involved in the theft.
Surely, it is very unfair to pass this burden onto honest consumers, who regularly pay their bills, just because the law enforcement arm of the government is unable to do its job properly.
It is reported that the secretary also sarcastically mentioned the presence of firms offering services to disrupt ABC bundles, regularly employed for power theft, and that the people of Sukkur had the honour of introducing this technique.
These revelations beg the very serious question of what exactly is being done about them, especially since a long chain of disruption and theft has already been identified and the rot has been traced all the way to employees in the distribution network? It is, of course, appreciated that the power division is toggling its options as best it can, including a drive to install meters in transformers to contain the foul play. But it is necessary, and far more efficient, to first round up all the bad guys and teach them a good lesson. And this cleansing will never come full circle till the collusion inside the system is also eliminated.
Ordinary Pakistanis are already having trouble digesting the fact that they are going to have to live with very expensive electricity, along with all other privileges, for a long time just because successive governments ran the country hopelessly into debt.
And since IMF’s (International Monetary Fund’s) structural adjustment, which is necessary to retain the bailout facility, has started stoking hyperinflation and unemployment, making them pay yet more just because of the power division’s miserable performance is sure to push them over the edge.
There is also the fact that without more power load shedding, there will be an additional financial burden of Rs220bn per month. That’s bad news not just for consumers but also for the government, especially in an election year.
If it returns to blackouts it will incur the wrath of the people and businesses, especially a very charged opposition, and risk coming out the loser. Yet not doing it and milking more losses out of consumers looks equally bad, if not worse. One would imagine that this desperation alone would drive it into urgent action against electricity thieves. But apparently it’s not so.
The secretary should also have come to the committee with something more than the usual line that a plan was being devised for recovery of thefts in Discos. He should at least have been asked why one was still being worked on even though this problem has been around for a very long time. It is precisely this attitude, of taking such things as business-as-usual, that has brought the entire sector to such a pass.
Even IMF officials are left scratching their heads when they discuss its structural problems with the government. If it continues to hemorrhage money completely unnecessarily, and all the government can do is watch from the side and issue statements while the circular debt gallops, then the only thing that can be said with certainty is that everybody’s problems will continue to mount; except of course the people that steal electricity and get away with it.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023
