Apparently reliable sources have told the press that Minister of Electricity Hassan Younis has given firm instructions to his assistants in the Holding Company of Electricity to draw up emergency plans to overcome an estimated shortage of 4,000 megawatts in the Egypt's supply of electricity next year. It has been said that unless these technicians and officials succeed in their task, the nation will be plunged into even more darkness next summer. Finding himself in an embarrassingly difficult position, the beleaguered Minister has appealed to the nation to rationalise its consumption by five per cent to survive the unprecedented crisis. It is apparent that Younis has been cruelly abandoned by his Prime Minister and Cabinet colleagues. Since power cuts became the rule in many areas of Cairo earlier this summer, Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif has refused to explain to angry citizens what steps his Government has taken to deal with the crisis. The Minister's miserable appeal for rationalisation of power consumption will undoubtedly fall on deaf ears. This is because rationalisation is not a word found in the vocabulary of the poor or the rich in Egypt. Poor and low-income families have already been forced to rationalise the food they can buy, but electricity is still cheap, so they can afford the luxury of running one miserable fan. Meanwhile, the rich can afford whatever they like, even if they don't need it. They can go out and buy five or six air-conditioning units for their huge apartments and villas. (The ACs in their Mercedes and BMWs run off the car battery, so that's a different story). Anyway, do you really think they're going to listen to the Minister of Electricity? We doubt it.
