PBIF chief concerned at Rs 1.5 trillion circular debts

President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum (PBIF), Mian Zahid Hussain said that Rs1.5 trillion circular debts is a serious threat to the economy. All the efforts to bring circular debt to a single digit have failed while the recent report of Asian Development Bank (ADB) has contradicted the claims of the top government official, he said.

He said that the government officials have claimed to bring down the debt to Rs12 billion per month from Rs38 billion while some have claimed to reduced it to single digit but the ADB's recent report says that it's Rs21 billion per month.

He noted that contradictory reports are a question mark on the claims of energy officials and it also proves that things are not as good as presented to the Prime Minister.

He informed that ADB has released the report at a time when the government is securing a loan of one billion dollars to improve the energy sector and it has committed to increasing the power tariff on quarterly basis.

The ADB has called upon the authorities that the total amount of circular debt was a threat to the economy and the immediate priority was to stop further accumulation of circular debt.

ADB has also been assured that Nepra Act would be amended to give it the power to determine tariff and keep circular debt below Rs120 billion for the current year.

He added that annually electricity worth Rs200 billion is stolen while primitive transmission and the distribution system, recovery issues, corruption, and incompetence are contributing to the debt which is financed by the government by taking loans from the banks to avoid disruption in oil imports.