PPP to rally all parliamentary groups in Sindh Assembly over gas crisis

The Sindh government of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) on Thursday decided to contact all the parliamentary groups in the provincial assembly so that the issue of a severe shortage of natural gas can be unanimously voiced.

Energy Minister Imtiaz Ahmad Shaikh has been tasked with the responsibility to rally all the support required for the issue. He has already started making contact in this regard.

Shaikh called up Khawaja Izharul Hassan and Kanwar Naveed Jameel, lawmakers of the opposition Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P), and discussed with them the issues relating to the prevailing gas crisis in the province.

The minister said that a collective voice needs to be raised from the province on the issue of the persistent gas crisis, for which the support of all the parliamentary groups is required.

As part of his contact campaign, he will also talk to the leaders of the opposition parliamentary groups of the Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA), the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan and the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal.

Talking to the media at his office, the energy minister said the Sindh government had no role in discovering new gas reserves in the province because it is the domain of the federal administration and the provincial government is only lending support to the Centre.

Shaikh said the federal government should take action against its relevant ministers and authorities who had failed to ensure gas supply to the province, which had an abundance of natural energy resources, including natural gas reserves.

He said the Sindh government may convene an all-party conference on the issue of the prevailing gas shortfall in the province, adding that the concerned political parties and the civil society will be invited to attend the meeting.

He, however, clarified that if an all-party conference were to be convened, it would be organised only after getting the necessary approval from the leadership of the ruling PPP.

He said the MQM-P and the GDA are coalition partners in the present federal government, adding that on the basis of the electoral mandate they have gained from Sindh, they should raise with the Centre the genuine issues of Sindh’s people, including the severe gas shortfall.

Meanwhile, the chief minister’s law adviser Barrister Murtaza Wahab, who is also the spokesman for the provincial government, said the people of Sindh should get gas supply in accordance with the constitutional rights of the province.

Wahab said Sindh accounts for up to 70 per cent of the natural gas produced in the country, but even then the inhabitants of the province do not get sufficient gas supply to meet their energy requirements.

He said the people of the province are facing severe hardships due to the curtailment of gas supply to their households, causing them immense problems in cooking their meals.

He added that public transportation in the province had been virtually off the road due to prolonged and recurring shutdown of gas supply to filling stations selling compressed natural gas in the province.

The adviser said that the industrial activity in Sindh can come to a grinding halt due to the curtailment of gas supply to the industries of the province.

He said the government of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf has been causing immense hardships to the people across the country in terms of their basic economic and energy needs instead of offering them any relief.