Pak: unscheduled power outages lead to Trader’s strike

Traders in Pakistan’s Mansehra and Shinkiari towns on Thursday held a shutter-down strike in response to the “prolonged and unscheduled” power outages, Pakistan-based Dawn newspaper reported.
Mansehra is a city in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan and the headquarters of Mansehra District. Chairman of the Shinkiari Traders’ Association Alamgir Shah, said: “Our businesses are already suffering from record inflation and are badly hit by the daylong load-shedding as well to our misery.”
Shah said, besides downing shutters, the traders would stage a protest rally as well.
Shah said the Peshawar Electric Supply Company suspended electricity from 9 am to 4 pm every other hour, Dawn reported.
President of the association Zuhaib Shah said harsh economic conditions had rendered traders and shopkeepers unable to pay rent of their shops and business centres, so they couldn’t afford to bear expenses for household goods and children’s education.The traders’ central body met in Mansehra and demanded the government do away with the prolonged and unscheduled load-shedding.
Chairman of the traders’ body Fayyaz Solaria told reporters that the federal government should ensure an uninterrupted electric supply to shops and business centres.