Opposition party lawmaker and ex-premier Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has taken a swipe at the ruling PTI over energy crisis, 24NewsHD TV Channel reported on Friday.

Flanked by Ahsan Iqbal and other party leaders, Shahid told the media that the government’s ‘incompetence’ behind energy crisis.

They (government reps) are buying the LNG at an expensive rate, he said adding that one of them alleged the former government ran expensive plants but the same plants are open and the cheap ones have been shut down.

He said that the government was buying furnace oil 20% higher than the market rate. In 2018, the cabinet decided that furnace oil won’t be imported and after creating an LNG shortage, furnace oil is being imported,” he said

They are lying brazenly as they are incompetent, Abbasi stressed and demanded the government tell tell the people why loadshedding is being done.

There is no problem of transmission, he said and claimed his government provided the people with additional electricity through those lines.

Ministers do not know which plants run on furnace oil and which ones run on LNG, he added.

Abbasi, who was also the minister for petroleum and natural resources in his party rule, also challenged the PTI to register a case against him if he had purchased expensive LNG.

He claimed that the PTI government had no planning for LNG and that was the main reason behind the import of furnace oil.

He also alleged that some people in the present government were taking Rs1 billion commission on “each furnace oil ship” coming into the country.

The PML-N leader attacked the incumbent government for changes at the Ministry of Energy. He claimed that when a new minister comes, a new story emerges on the problems being faced by the energy sector. Abbasi said that a minister claimed that former prime minister Nawaz Sharif created surplus electricity in the country. He also said that another minister, who was removed, claimed that transmission issues being faced by the energy sector were not “rectified” in the past government's tenure.

Reporter: Awais Kiyani