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Fuel crisis bites harder in city
Motorists drive past fuel stations on Jinja Road in Kampala yesterday. PHOTO / ISAAC KASAMANI
What you need to know:
- Daily Monitor during a mini-survey of some the fuel stations within the city centre and the neighbouring suburbs of Kibuli, Kasanga, Kabalagala, Muyenga, Makerere, Bugolobi, Kitintale, Luzira, Banda and Kireka established that Shell and Total fuel stations were the most affected.
A number of fuel stations within Kampala City yesterday ran out of petrol, a crisis that has affected many motorists whose vehicles.
Daily Monitor during a mini-survey of some the fuel stations within the city centre and the neighbouring suburbs of Kibuli, Kasanga, Kabalagala, Muyenga, Makerere, Bugolobi, Kitintale, Luzira, Banda and Kireka established that Shell and Total fuel stations were the most affected.
Many Shell and Total fuel stations hardly had petrol in stock. However, they had diesel starting from Shs4,000 per litre.
At Shell Kampala Road, one of the pump attendants who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprimand, said they ran out of petrol yesterday morning.
He revealed that together with other pump attendants, they have since then continuously turned away motorists.
For Total, a manager of one of the fuel stations in Kitintale, said their petrol sold out on Monday.
“Yesterday (Tuesday), we had completely nothing in our tanks except for diesel which has a smaller client base,” he said.
Petrol challenge
While Shell and Total were out of petrol, other players surprisingly were not affected that much.
Fuel stations and companies such as GAZ, Stabex, SP and Oryx had petrol, however, at higher prices ranging between Shs5,000 and Shs6,000 per litre.
For kerosene, many of the fuel stations said they hardly deal in it because of fewer consumers, as the public has increasingly embraced trends such as solar power, generators and other improved devices for light.
When contacted, representatives from both Shell and Total said it was not possible to address the issue by press time, but would soon avail information on the matter.
On Monday, Mr Solomon Muyita, the spokesperson of the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development, said several trucks had made their way into the country on Sunday (January 16) so that Ugandans can get relief.
“We were able to get more than 200 trucks from the Kenyan border into the country,” he said.
The fuel crisis has continued to bite hard for the second week running as a result of the shortage caused by the delay of trucks at the Uganda-Kenya border.
