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Zambia: Motorists Abandon Work as Fuel Shortage Worsens
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The Times of Zambia (Ndola)
5 October 2007
Posted to the web 5 October 2007
Ndola
THE acute fuel shortage that has hit the Copperbelt and various parts of the country yesterday worsened forcing some Ndola motorists to abandon their work spending long hours on queues in a bid to buy the commodity.
A check by the Times revealed that most filling stations in the city had run out of the commodity apart from the Zambezi Oil Transport (ZOT) Company filling station along Broadway where there were long queues on both Broadway and Shinde road entrances to the filling station.
Motorists, Adamson Chibuta and Peter Musamaba said they were tired of spending long hours on the queues for fuel, and called on authorities to immediately end the fuel shortages.
Another motorist, Dante Saunders said he was forced to stop business he was conducting on the Copperbelt because he was spending more time searching for fuel than working.
"Time has come for the Government to privatise Indeni in order to pave way for the private sector to provide efficient services to end the fuel shortages which are not only necessary but inconveniencing.," said Mr Saunders.
The situation was the same in Kitwe, Mufulira and Chingola where motorists were queuing for petrol at a few filling stations that had the commodity.
Meanwhile, some oil marketing companies (OMCs) have said the continued fuel shortage was as a result of temporary closure of the Indeni Petroleum Refinery plant.
Kobil Zambia public relations officer, Rebecca Chisanga said there was nothing strange about the fuel shortage which was temporary and being worsened by panic-buying by some motorists.
Ms Chisanga said at the moment his company had no problems with stock levels such that it would be able to meet the demands of its share of the market on the Copperbelt and various parts of the country where it had fuel outlets.
"It is normal to have a temporary situation where some filing stations have no fuel in some parts of the country while other areas have sufficient supply of fuel. At times when Indeni is on break we have situations when Lusaka and other parts of the country experiencing shortages due to delays caused by transportation and other logistics-related problems," she said.
ZOT managing director, Robinson Malanje said his company was expecting some more supplies which would help it to meet demand on the Copperbelt.
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Ministry of Energy and Water Development Permanent Secretary Buleti Nsemukila assured that the situation would return to normal today.
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| Copyright © 2007 The Times of Zambia. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections -- or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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