Hoarding the Fuel, Hiking Transportation – the Bad Blood

Sierra Leone business people are never free from the virus of greed and profiteering and as such the effect is usually like a contagion that spreads forth to even the smallest of business enterprises and the ordinary man ends up taking the blunt of all the greed and derisive plotting using their economic and business might.

The effects of the recent artificial scarcity on fuel that hit the country still linger in many ways. As has been the custom, whenever there is increase in the cost of fuel, there is usually the corresponding effects on all other goods and services in the country even if they seem to have no connection whatsoever with factors that led to the crisis.

The past case of apparent increase in the fuel price is a hoax; a deliberate ploy to have the price increased; hoarding it so that they make ungainly profits at the detriment of the ordinary consumer.

The surge of such bad blood usually comes at very delicate moment when it appears there is such a mad rush for business no matter the cost and it appears the wake of festive seasons are the usual convenient times that are targeted.  

The approach the December festive season it appears is what the wishful traders in the country are taking advantage of to create artificial scarcity so that the price of fuel and other basic commodities are increased and load their pockets with some extra bucks.

Even though the government and major oil marketers in the country have made it abundantly clear that nothing has gone wrong with fuel supply and price, some obstinate business men have resorted to making certain the effects of the fuel hike on the normalcy of life in the country is felt.

Up to press time, taxi drivers were still resorting to nefarious means of administering transportation services to people in the city using the recent attempt at hiking fuel price as yard stick. Taxis now resort to shuttling between short distances, only and if one requests a further resort, you are charged extra in name of the apparent fuel rise which never actually took hold. Others would tell upfront Le 100 instead of the usual Le 800 that has been the case ever since the stability in fuel prices earlier this year.

As it is, a cross section of oil dealers have insisted on ensuring that the rise in fuel price takes hold citing factors like the rise in the exchange rate of the US$ and the price of oil in the world market.  When the last increment was made in the standing price from Le12,500 to the current Le14,800 the exchange rate in the US$ staggered at Le3,000 to Le3,200 but it has now shot up to record Le4,300 making business to take advantage of the unprecedented rise to ensure that they make their gains. The government and consumer protection on the other hand argue that current stocks on the market are not acquired and that the present exchange and thus must not be affected.

Whilst drivers have resorted to making life uncomfortable one way or the other for the people, other marketers have also resorted to shooting the prices of basic commodities locally produced or otherwise.

This blend of situations wherein there is attempt at unnecessarily raising the price of fuel and the rise in the exchange rate leaves the poor man grappling for survival amidst hard times and economic tribulation.       

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