As was expected, the government’s decision to increase the price of not just petroleum products but also the electricity tariff has caused a commotion on the streets of the country. The citizens are outraged that the newly elected government has dropped one financial bomb after another to add to their financial woes. They are not alone; the mammoth increase has translated into electricity tariffs going up by as much as 30 percent for high-end consumers and the cost of petrol going up by as much as 4.2 percent, and so the Supreme Court (SC) has also taken suo motu notice. The SC has lamented the fact that the only people to really suffer from these price hikes will be the poor and that the government should have focused its efforts in collecting the outstanding dues of Rs 441 billion instead of increasing the electricity tariff. Where this increase in electricity tariffs is concerned, the SC made no bones about how it did not understand under which authority the government had seen it fit to increase prices. It is the responsibility of the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) to adjust such increases and decreases in the electricity tariff, but when asked by the SC whether NEPRA had any part to play in these recent tariff hikes, officials from NEPRA were unequivocal in saying that they had made no such recommendations. This prompted the SC to seek all and any notifications by the government on just why and how the electricity tariff has been increased. It seems that the government itself decided to wield a sharp sword over the heads of the populace without bothering to go through the proper channels and processes. As far as the increase in oil prices is concerned, the SC observed that the recent hike did not seem to reflect international market trends, which has been the common excuse used to justify such price jumps. In fact, internationally, the cost of oil products has gone down. On the same day the Pakistan government dropped these two economic bombs, the Indian government decreased the cost of their petroleum products. No wonder the SC has taken stern note. The government has clearly started using the fluctuating trends in the oil market to its advantage, milking the sector like a cash cow and raising revenue for itself instead of deflating the burden on the common man.
It is understandable that the government needs to bridge a shortfall of more than Rs 440 billion in revenue but it is going about it in a dastardly fashion. It seems as if this new government is living in a bubble from where it cannot calculate the misery and suffering of the major portion of average Pakistanis. If, for one moment, we accept that the government has its hands tied because of its borrowing money from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), it should not have pulled the rug from under the people’s feet like this; it should have reduced electricity subsidies in a phased manner so that the already poor and stifled public could have dealt with the blow with a little more ease. However, the double whammy has resulted in the government turning almost everyone against it: the judiciary, the opposition parties who have slammed this move, the business community, which will feel the impact of these measures with full force, and the citizenry that has cried itself hoarse too many times before. The government needs to start thinking in its own interest and pull itself out of this regime of bad policies, mismanagement, poor handling and arrogant aloofness. If making sacrifices is the need of the day, when will those in power start making some themselves? Expensive foreign tours, fancy hotel stays, Michelin star dinners and a whole fleet of hangers on who enjoy these protocols, all are managed through the national exchequer. If the struggling citizens are made to live with austerity and too little on their plate, government leaders too need to get their act together and strive for the moral high ground, which requires a fair degree of austerity on their part as well. The people are not blind and they will no longer be fooled by self-serving arguments that cause more misery. *