Press Release
The electricity crisis in Karachi is due to the connivance of our rulers with their colonialist masters

Our rulers and the corrupt capitalist system is the root cause of the electricity crisis which seems to erupt quite frequently in Karachi and interior Sindh. Rulers have abandoned their responsibility to provide basic utility like electricity by privatizing KESC (Karachi Electric Supply Corporation) and left the people on the mercy of KESC management. Today the people of Karachi are reaping the fruit of that decision in the shape of energy crisis. These are the capitalist policies, which IMF and the colonialist nations implemented in Pakistan through their agent rulers. As a result, these public assets fall in the hands of the multinationals and the few capitalists. "Good governance" is reduced to just announcements of new taxes and issuance of warnings in case of the non payment of these taxes. It's a public knowledge that Pakistan can produce more than required electricity through wind, hydro and coal resources but for the last sixty years no serious effort has been made to accomplish this easy target. The primary reason behind this inaction was to keep Pakistan economically weak to perpetuate its slavery and subservience to the colonialists. And our rulers performed this task quite happily in order to protect their thrones. Hence the energy crisis in a country like Pakistan, which has abundant resources, is only due to the cunning planning of the colonialist and the relentless hard work of our agent rulers to implement these plans. Current rulers are doing a good job of keeping Pakistan engulfed in new crises very day.

Islam forbids the privatisation of energy resources and the Messenger of Allah (saw) declared these resources to be in public domain and he never allowed any individual or a company to own it. The Messenger of Allah (saw) said:

"Muslims are partners in three (things): Water, pasture and fire (i.e. energy resource)."

To pull Karachi out of the current energy crisis Hizb ut Tahrir demands the cancellation of privatisation of KESC and all power generating units should be declared public property and government should manage these units herself. Furthermore, the government should provide electricity to the people at the cost which she incurs in its production and distribution (i.e. no-profit no-loss basis). As result of these polices people will be relieved of the blackmailing and over pricing of these companies, they will get cheap electricity as well as the government will directly be held accountable.

Shahzad Shaikh
The Deputy Spokesman of Hizb ut-Tahrir in Pakistan