HYDERABAD: The Pakistan Sunni Tehreek (PST) has demanded removal of Hyderabad Electric Supply Company (Hesco) chief over prolonged loadshedding in the city.

Speaking at a news conference in the local press club on Tuesday, PST Senior Vice President Mohammad Khalid Qadri, Divisional President Talat Mahmood and District President Mohammad Bachal also demanded resignation of the federal energy minister.

They announced holding of a multi-party conference next week against Hesco’s “excesses”, and said that a siege would be laid outside its headquarters.

They said they would hold a protest rally in the city. Lawyers and traders would be approached to join the protest, they added.

The PST leaders demanded that all superintending engineers and executive engineers of Hesco should hear complaints of consumers for two hours a day and resolve their issues.

They also demanded that agreements with independent power producers (IPPs) should be revoked forthwith.

“Names of the politicians who are associated with the IPPs and have received thousands of billions of rupees from them should be made public,” they stressed.

They asked how and at whose behest billions of rupees were being paid to the IPPs on account of capacity charges (i.e. even if they do not generate electricity). They said that taxes and the slabs-based tariff should be done away with. They demanded an end to “extortion” in the name of repair of transformers.

The leaders said that an inquiry should be conducted into the shutdowns of 30 to 50 feeders on a daily basis. Transformers should be installed in all those areas from where they have been removed. All thermal power plants should be made functional, they added.

“Hesco has been effecting an unannounced loadshedding of 14 to 16 hours daily. Detection bills are being issued to consumers and collected forcibly,” they deplored, and noted that Rs50,000 to Rs80,000 was being extorted in the name of repair of each broken down transformer in different areas. They said that consumers were made to run from pillar to post to get their bills corrected.

The PST leaders also lamented that unnecessary taxes were included in electricity bills. They alleged that substandard material was being used in transformers due to which they got burst. They said ever since posting of the incumbent Hesco chief executive officer (CEO), loadshedding hours had increased despite the prevailing unbearably hot and suffocating weather conditions.

Published in Dawn, July 24th, 2024