Arbitrage
The Khaleej Times reports:
The Khaleej Times reports:
Al Ain residents are making a beeline to Buraimi, the border town of the Sultanate of Oman, saving Dh15 on a tank full.UPDATE: MORE. The Gulf News reports:
Motorists have been clogging the main Buraimi-Al Ain road, and Omani police had to intervene to restore traffic flow several times. "We had to close down our station for three hours on police request for the restoration of traffic on the road," said Joseph George, manager of an Omanoil Petrol Station in Buraimi.
Fuel prices have increased by 30 per cent in the UAE. Fuel prices in Buraimi are still unchanged and a large number of motorists have been going there to buy petrol at a cheaper rate.
. . .
"We have been operating round the clock and have so far sold about 33,000 gallons of petrol from this station which is just a few hundred feet across the UAE border," he said.
Petrol stations in Buraimi have been getting extra supplies from Muscat, about 350km away from Buraimi, to meet the the increased demand. "We don't have any problem with the supply as who have told to pick up as much of the business as we can," said George.
. . .
A majority of these motorists are taxi drivers who are upset by the price hike. They say fuel prices have gone up but the authorities have not increased the taxi fare in Abu Dhabi emirate for the last 20 years.
posted by John B. Chilton at 9/05/2005 08:38:00 AM
2 Comments:
Your comment about the taxi drivers is very true. One cabbie we use here regularly in Al Ain has been here for 18 years. He says the fare has always remained the same, despite increase in the cost of living, the weakening of the dirham and now these fuel price hikes. No wonder many of these taxis are falling to bits, the drivers drive like maniacs in order to get as many fares as possible throughout the day (the fare is based on distance, not time, unlike London)
Some drivers are now refusing to switch on the AC in order to save on petrol...phew!
In the meantime, their sponsors are making a pretty penny out of all this charging an average 2500 dirhams rent per month and expected the driver to pay for his own maintainance. Let see how happy they'd be if they passed the fuel costs onto the sponsors.
I guess the attitude is the same as ever- if you don't like it, go home. There are hundred of taxis in Al Ain alone so would anyone really notice if some of them upped sticks? Besides, despite the fuel hike they're still making more money than what they'd earn back home. They're just having to work a lot harder. In the meantime, its no sweat of the sponsors' back.
Just what the Omani government's been wish for, an excuse to raise fuel prices in Oman. I bet now they'll see it's not right that Oman is providing indirect subsidy to motorists in the UAE and increase their prices too.
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