Irrawaddy-Mar 26
The fuel crisis in Myanmar is worsening, throwing the country into chaos and doubling the prices of basic necessities. Fuel shortages due to the wars in the Middle East are compounded by international sanctions and catastrophic mismanagement by the military regime.
In the commercial capital Yangon, second city Mandalay and elsewhere, queues of vehicles at gas stations are stretching for several miles as pumps runs dry despite the regime’s insistence Sunday that the country’s diesel and gasoline reserves are enough to meet demand for another 50 days. Regime officials are cruising the streets with loudspeakers urging drivers to stop panic buying and to go back home. Amid chaotic scenes witnessed by The Irrawaddy, a container truck driver assigned to depart Yangon for Mandalay on Thursday said: “I waited in a long queue since 11 a.m. on Tuesday, but at 2 p.m. the gas station stopped selling when it ran out of fuel.” In Yangon’s North Okkalapa Township, for example, the retail price of a bag of cement has risen from 21,000 kyats to over 30,000 kyats as a result, while the price of a medium truckload of gravel has soared from 280,000 to 600,000 kyats, a resident said. The driver of a trishaw—a scooter with sidecar for local passenger transport—from Yangon’s Insein Township said most of these vehicles are not even allowed to refuel at gas stations because they are unregistered. Instead, they have to buy fuel on the black market—at a price of up to 9,000 kyats per liter for Octane 92, compared to the official price of 3,610 kyats. Another trishaw driver said rising prices are pushing people deeper into poverty. “This global crisis is making it hard for poor people like us to afford even basic meals,” he said. Read more at: https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/burma/chaos-reigns-across-myanmar-as-fuel-crisis-deepens.html
