Power outage in Karachi over no bill payment (entire city of 15 million blacked out)

[bananas]

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gbmFBuCwS59uDt3Z8MhGSTnNYCZwD8V7OUHO0

Power Outage Hits Major Pakistan City

1 hour ago

KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) — A massive power outage struck Pakistan's largest city of Karachi early Thursday and left the entire city of more than 15 million people without electricity, a spokesman said.

It was not immediately clear what caused the outage or when power would be restored, said Sultan Hassan, a spokesman for the Karachi Electric Supply Corp.

Power from the state-run Water and Power Development Authority was suddenly cut, prompting the southern seaport city's entire electricity distribution network to shut down, Hassan said.

"The power supply has come to zero. That is unprecedented," Hassan said. "We are trying to find out why the power supply from WAPDA was discontinued."

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http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2008/March/subcontinent_March198.xml§ion=subcontinent

Power outage in Karachi over no bill payment
(Reuters)

6 March 2008

KARACHI - Pakistan’s commercial capital Karachi suffered a major power outage on Thursday when the country’s main power utility cut the supply because the city’s power company had not paid its bills, an official said.

Karachi is Pakistan’s biggest city with a population of more than 13 million and is home to many industries, the country’s two main ports and its main stock market.

“At around 8:00 a.m. (0300 GMT) WAPDA cut its 300 MW supplies to us and as a result the entire system tripped,” said Syed Sultan Hasan, spokesman for the Karachi Electric Supply Co. KESC.KA, which supplies power to Karachi.

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“KESC owes 34.80 billion rupees ($554 million) to us and we have been writing to them every week to make at least some payments to us,” said the spokesman, Tahir Basharat Cheema.

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[aquart]

1. Privatization?

[diane in sf]

2. Piratization, time for Karachi to build a municipal power utility.

[aquart]

3. I like your word better.