Governments, foreign missions, others: K-E consumers' default exceeds Rs 49 billion

The management of K-Electric is busy mapping out what a company spokesman said strategy to recover about Rs 49 billion electricity bills from federal, provincial and city government defaulters. According to KE figures, Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KW&SB) appears to be the biggest defaulter thus a 'major concern' for the power supplier. Water Board owes to KE more than Rs 36.870 billion of the total Rs 48.937 billion.
The KW&SB consumes 40-45 megawatts of electricity during 24 hours at its water pumps where a recent four-hour power suspension caused severe water crisis in the metropolis, the country's most-populated city with an estimated 20 million people. Others using KE's electricity without paying regular bills include all three tiers of the government. The federal departments, including cantonment boards, are sitting on bills worth over Rs 1.675 billion, Sindh departments Rs 2.230 billion, Balochistan government Rs 32.274 million and the now-defunct City District Government Karachi (CDGK) Rs 8.08 billion.
Interestingly, the KE's defaulter list also includes the head of "embassies" of foreign countries whose net arrears accumulate to Rs 17.650 million. A KE spokesman, however, would not reveal country-wise detail of these embassies. "They (embassies) make continual payments," the spokesman told Business Recorder.
The KE's federal government defaulters include Export Processing Zones Authority owing Rs 126.50 million, Divisional Superintendent of Pakistan Railways Rs 111.85 million, Defence Housing Authority Rs 103.17 million, Civil Aviation Authority Rs 102.42 million, WAPDA Rs 83.7 million, PIA Rs 79.9 million, Pakistan PWD Karachi Rs 67.4 million, hospitals and dispensaries Rs 52.5 million, University Grant Commission Rs 47.3 million, Lyari Expressway Resettlement project Rs 41.7 million, Cantonment boards of Clifton and Faisal Rs 38.7 and Rs 33.7 million, Pakistan Machine Tools Factory Rs 28.4 million, Port Qasim Authority Rs 25.77 million, Sindh Workers Welfare Board Rs 21.71 million and SUPARCO Rs 19 million.
The entities related to Sindh government are Public Health Engineering defaulting over Rs 144.9 million, Director School Education Rs 138.96 million, Directorate of College (central) Rs 35.7 million, Sindh Industrial Trading Estate Rs 24.4 million Civil Hospital Rs 22.6 million, Board of Revenue Rs 15.33 million, Auqaf Department Rs 13.3 million, Lyari General Hospital Rs 11.5 million, Chief Engineer PWD Karachi Rs 10.8 million and Ojha Institute of Chest Diseases Rs 10 million.
While outstanding dues of towns and union councils of the city government total Rs 8.08 billion, the KW&SB alone is liable to over Rs 36.870 billion to KE. The two utilities in recent weeks have been at loggerheads each pointing a finger at the other while fixing responsibility for one of the city's worst water crisis that is still not over. Perhaps this rivalry makes the Water Board, as a KE spokesman put it, a "major concern" for the power utility.
"Our major concern is the KWSB and Sindh government which on record had earmarked Rs 5 billion in FY15 budget to be paid to KE on account of electricity bills," he recalled. While FY15 is going to end within a fortnight KWSB had not paid a single penny out of budgeted Rs 5 billion to KE, the spokesman claimed. "Against their monthly bills of Rs 600.650 million they hardly pay Rs 400-500 million," the spokesman claimed. "That too once in a blue moon," he added.
The spokesman said given the ever-increasing demand for electricity in the energy-scarce country, the company would have found for it new "good paying customers" had it not been stayed by the Sindh High Court from suspending supplies to the KW&SB.
Upping the ante with KWSB, the privately-run power utility appears to be accommodative towards its other defaulting consumers. The company, masterly owned by the Abraaj Group of UAE, claims to have repeatedly been issuing deadlines to the federal and provincial government departments for the clearance of their outstanding dues but in vain.
"We have been offering them, the Sindh government, different payment plans but all fell on deaf ears," the spokesman lamented. However, the KE management was holding internal discussions to pressurize the Sindh government for the payment of KW&SB's Rs 37 billion dues.
Last Wednesday, KE took into confidence Shahid Hayat Khan, Sindh Director of Federal Investigation Agency, as the company has embarked on Operation Burq, a campaign against electricity theft in the city. The recovery clampdown that targets residential, commercial and industrial thieves has nothing to do with the public sector institutional defaulters, the KE spokesman said.