IN a bid to curb the looming fuel shortage in the country, the government has borrowed 50 percent of the total liters of fuel in stock for local oil marketing companies which was to be sold to landlocked countries in order to normalize the impending looming crisis. EWURA’s Public Communications Manager, Titus Kagua told a press conference yesterday in Dar es Salaam that, out of a total 80 million liters of fuel on transit, 40 million liters will be sold in local market by oil companies after fulfilling conditions of the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) that requires them to pay 100 tax. He said out of the pending oil stock, already 21.3 million liters of diesel, 5.2 million liters of petrol as well as 1.4 million liters of kerosene respectively, have been ordered by nine local oil companies in order to cover the deficit and added that, they would not be allowed to sell unless they pay 100 percent of their tax due to be charged by TRA. He also noted that, the stock to be put on sale will help prolong the days for which the country is running short of. Clarifying his point, he noted that, Diesel will be used for 17days in total if added with the current stock in market. Others like petrol will now be used for 14 days, while the kerosene which has the largest usage will be in market for 7 days. However, he said that, the days mentioned of usage are in addition of the quantity of fuel which is currently in market.
EWURA’s Public Communications Manager, Titus Kaguo elaborating a point to journalists (not in the picture) during a press conference in Dar es Salaam.
Clarifying liters of fuel which are currently in market before the additional fuel on transit, he noted that, there is 35.8 million liters of diesel, 16.7 million liters of petrol, 11.7 million liters of jet fuel and 500,000 liters of kerosene. In view of the above quotations, the regulator’s boss has assured the public that, the supply of fuel will come to a normal situation as within a couple of one week’s time two big oil ships will be offloading fuel which will cater for the entire country’s need and another stock will be used to replace the gap left for the fuel taken from the transit stock. He has however, dismissed claims by few individuals who speculated that the current shortage is as a result of the recently imposed indicative price quotations that lowered the percentage rate in price as earlier announced in October. Elaborating the reasons why there is a shortage of the commodity in upcountry regions, he stated that, this is due to transport problems which are exacerbated by poor infrastructure all the way during transportation of the oil tankers by road. He couldn’t however clarified the kind of infrastructure that could be possibly have been the major cause of delay for the delivery at various designated depots in upcountry, but noted that, the oil tankers needs care while on transit to abide by their safety regulations. Elaborating on the current regions hit by the shortage such as Tanga and Singida, Kaguo noted that, it’s because of the market situation which he said is affected by users and sellers of the commodity. In this aspect, Kaguo clarified that, the orders placed by oil companies goes alongside with the consumption and traders have to be careful on that. Explaining the reasons why there was delays for oil deliveries at the Port, he noted that, the Tanzania Ports Authority (TPA) had failed to give priority to oil ships to offload the commodity citing the major reasons as was due to technical problems at the port. However, he made it clear that, the offloading had delayed for 19 days prior to the berthing of oil ships at the port and added that within this period, the nation was at that time still using the reserve stock. Meanwhile, physical survey at various filling stations in most parts in Dar es Salaam city showed that there are still some filling stations which do not have fuel stock, and reports from upcountry painted a worse scenario. At Mara region in Tarime district, it was noted that filling stations in towns’ centers had no fuel. Survey in some parts of the country shows that the price of fuel has drastically increased as some is sold in black market that fetched between Sh. 3,000 and Sh. 5,000 per liter for petrol or diesel respectively.
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