Editorial
Public impatience with frequent power outage
Take them into confidence on a doable action plan
ANGERED by repeated power load shedding, ruefully without notice, residents and workers of Araihazar in Narayanganj left a trail of damage as they ransacked a power sub-station, rural power supply office and a police outpost. This is the first public outburst over a situation whose desperate nature is increasingly dawning on us. Ominously, however, it could be the foretaste of more to come with the government looking perilously close to a full fledged law and order situation. The government, which has had more than its fair share of misfortunes can scarcely entertain such a prospect.
On the other hand though, quite clearly there is little that the government can do to dramatically bring normality in power supply to all manner of consumers, household, industrial and farmland. The huge power deficit is not of this government's making; it is quite evidently inherited, but the harsh reality is it's an academic issue to the people who are suffering it on a daily basis and in rapid progression at that. Not before three years in the very least can power supply be normalised.
Basically, we are faced with a tri-lemma here, if one could coin such a word: there is no way we can generate the needed minimum of power in the immediate future; public frustrations cannot be trifled with or swept under the carpet; and indeed police action can hardly be the answer; on the contrary, it could recoil.
Whilst nobody is left in any doubt that the government is seriously considering various options, short-run, medium-term and long-run, in a bid to improve the energy situation on a sustained basis, there is an impression though that these are somewhat overlapping without any perceptible delineation being made between options. We need to concentrate on the immediate do's, like for instance, better load management, promoting energy efficiency, importing liquefied natural gas to fire power, restoring some of the lost generation capacity, some of which have been emphasised by Dr Towfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury, energy adviser to the Prime Minister and go about acting on them urgently.
Whatever the government does it must unveil its plan of action with a clear time-line and share its details with the public, not couched in technical jargon, but in terms that they can readily understand and appreciate so as to carry the public with it. A massive public information campaign should be launched to generate confidence in the people that sure-footed alleviation measures are really in prospect.
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