Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The shortage of petrol due to a strike by the All Pakistan Oil Tankers Owners Association forced motorcyclists and vehicle owners to stand in long queues outside the filling stations for fuel in Rawalpindi and Islamabad on Wednesday.

The crisis involving petroleum products intensified in twin cities, like other parts of the country, as the strike entered the third consecutive day. Most of the filling stations had suspended their operations while long queues of commuters were being seen at the filling stations that still had some fuel left.

The strike was being observed by the oil tankers’ owners in protest over a number of issues pertaining to issuance of traffic fines by the motorway police, strict regulations of the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) relating to the fitness of vehicles and differences over transportation fare with the oil marketing companies. The regulations were issued by OGRA in the wake of the Ahmedpur Sharqia incident, which led to the death of 218 people in Punjab last month.

A motorcyclist, Yasir Raza, who was waiting in a queue for petrol at a filling station of Pakistan State Oil (PSO) on main Murree Road, while talking to Daily Times said, “I am here (the fuel station) for the last two hours because I don’t have the enough fuel to reach my destination.”

“The petrol pump management is filling the petrol of one hundred rupees only in each bike at a time. I will have to again wait for hours in the evening, if the strike will not end,” he added.

Usman Ashraf, a staff member at another petrol pump in Sector H-10, expressed his problems and briefed that he was working at the pump on daily wages and if the supply did not resume, he would have to face financial losses.

Meanwhile, there were reports of black marketing of petrol in some areas of the federal capital but when this scribe contacted a petrol pump’s owner in Rawalpindi, he informed, “We are not selling petrol in black, but we have restricted the filling only for our family members and friends keeping the scarcity of stock in view.”

The strike suspended the supply of petroleum products in the whole country, as the movement of nearly 23,000 oil tankers in the country came to a halt.

However, following successful talks with the government, the All Pakistan Oil Tankers Owners Association announced to call off the strike in the afternoon. The people associated with the petroleum business said that the supply of petrol had resumed and filling stations would start getting the fuel in a day or two.

Published in Daily Times, July 27^th 2017.