Fuel shortages, inflation, IMF facility and stability - EDITORIAL

For the past few months, vehicle owners (including farmers, fishermen, persons involved in essential services and transportation) in our country have been forced to park their vehicles in front of petrol sheds for days on end, to avail themselves of their fuel requirements.

When the precious liquid does arrive at petrol sheds, law-abiding citizens have to watch helplessly as gaggles of raucous trishaw drivers and friends of petrol station owners strong-arm their way to the petrol pumps, not heeding the long queues of vehicles which had arrived long before them. 
To add to the shame, in many instances members of the clergy too pull their weight to have their vehicle tanks filled breaking queues.

To make matters, a 3-wheeler mafia has set up their own unofficial petrol distribution sites. Petrol is sold at these sites at prices ranging from Rs. 2,000/- to Rs 2,500/ per litre. The modus operandi - fill up a 3-wheeler at a particular station/shed, empty the contents into a jerry can and rejoin the queue at the particular shed or another in the vicinity - and the process is repeated.

Sadly, the forces of the law standby idle until frustrated the citizens march up to them demanding a reason as to why fuel is being provided only to trishaws and vehicles breaking the queue.
From today (August 1), the Ministry of Power and Energy has announced, the QR code system for fuel rationing. The system will be implemented, canceling the existing ‘last digit on the number plate‘ method which was in operation until yesterday.

The rationing of fuel for personal use was made necessary, in the light of the IMF having indicated fuel imports need be cut by 40% for at least a year, so as to keep the export sector sustainable, via balancing exports to fuel imports, to the repayment of US$ 51 billion to foreign creditors.

Government has to present a sustainable debt repayment plan for the IMF to provide a debt restructuring facility. It is only after such a facility is in place, until international creditors begin to lend once again. The QR code system also puts into action a plan to tackle the problem created by the three wheeler mafia. From August 1, all three wheelers will have to be registered at their respective police stations. They will also have to nominate a filling station of their choice where rationed fuel will be provided.
The QR code system has already been tested in over 400 fuel stations over the past week. Members of the ‘Daily Mirror’ have tested the system and seen its efficacy. 

Petrol sheds at Bulugaha Junction in Kelaniya and at the Bakery Junction in Mount Lavinia do not use the QR code. Despite having parked vehicles overnight, and despite petrol bowsers unloading at both sheds in the early hours of the morning. Sadly, even before 115 cars received fuel, filling station employees closed down the shed at around 9.30 pm, claiming fuel stocks were over!
Then information was received that the QR system was being trialed at the ‘Honda Hitha’ petrol shed at Nugegoda Junction where  a single worker was operating at a single pump. It took less than an hour to receive the allotted fuel! 

While the authorities are to be congratulated for successfully experimenting a workable system of rationing fuel, many major problems the public are facing.  According to the Census and Statistics Department, the Consumer Price Index has risen by over 60% Y-o-Y. Meanwhile the National Consumer Price Index increased to 58.9% in June 2022 from 45.3% in May 2022 and food inflation (Y-o-Y) increased to 75.8% in June 2022 from 58.0% in May 2022. Accordingly, Food inflation (Y-o-Y) increased to 75.8% in June 2022 from 58.0% in May 2022.

Large numbers of Small and Medium Industrial units have been forced to put up shutters, leaving thousands of families out of work. Many of the families of these workers can now be seen begging at street corners, shopping centres, supermarkets as well as at traffic lights in many areas of the city. They are indications of hunger and extreme hunger can easily boil over into anger. To avail ourselves of an IMF facility, the government has also to provide proof of stability. But taking numbers of the former ‘Aragalaya’ group alone is not going to provide the much needed stability in the country.

Government needs to also tackle the problems of growing hunger, and job losses which are driving the people onto the streets and into the hands of the ‘Aragalaya’, which, or whom, many see as the alternative to their present pauperized state.  
Government needs to pay more attention to solving these immediate problems rather than abusing the rights of those who have taken to the streets through sheer desperation and force of circumstances.