Gasoline disappears in the city of Malang
MALANG, East Java (JP): A shortage of gasoline continued to disrupt urban transportation in the city of Malang, some 90 kilometers south of Surabaya on Tuesday.
Owners of public transportation vehicles preferred not to operate; stranding would-be passengers on the roadsides.
Public transport drivers who worked, took advantage of the situation by increasing fares by 100 percent. However, people braved the jostling to board the vehicles as they had no choice.
"Today is worse than yesterday," Suwarno, an employee of Alfa wholesale shop told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.
Deny, a student of Muhammadiyah I Islamic High School, strongly complained. The first grade student, who has only enjoyed high school for two days, said he was afraid of being punished as he missed obligatory training. "It's a disaster."
Queues of hundreds of vehicles at gasoline stations have been usual in the tourist resort since Sunday.
At the Arjosari gasoline station a large number of mikrolet transportation vehicles had to wait in a 500-meter queue to get served.
"After waiting for more than three hours, each vehicle is allowed to buy no more than 10 liters. That small amount of gasoline will not last the distance we should serve. We'll have to stop operating at midday, and lose half of our income," Sutrisno, a mikrolet driver, said.
"I am still lucky, however. A friend of mine waited four hours and was told that the gasoline was finished," he added, pointing to another driver.
Dozens of private cars were seen waiting for gasoline at the station on Jl. Kawi. Karmani, one of the drivers, said he had to give up premium and buy Premix for his Suzuki Carry van.
"I don't have any idea why the government cannot handle such a situation?" said Karmani.
"There is no other option. The premium, which is cheaper, has gone. The gasoline station has only diesel fuel and Premix," he said, adding that he had waited four hours for the Premix.
The shortage of gasoline also hit the province of Bali and other towns in East Java, including Pasuruan, Gresik, Mojokerto, Jombang, Bojonegoro and Bangkalan on the island of Madura.
Balongan
The repair work at the Balongan refinery in Indramayu, West Java, was blamed for the shortage of gasoline in East Java.
"The refinery supplies a total of 4,000,000 liters of gasoline to East Java and Bali," an official of state-owned oil and gas company Pertamina, said.
Spokesman for Pertamina's East Java Supply and Home Distribution office Asep Aonuddin said on Tuesday that his company had purchased gasoline from Singapore for East Java and Bali. "Unfortunately the ship is late."
Asep said he guaranteed that supplies would be normal on Wednesday (today). "The Bunga Karkas tanker ship carrying a total of 5,900 kiloliters of premium from Balikpapan (East Kalimantan) has just arrived at the Tanjung Perak seaport. While this afternoon (Tuesday) tanker ship Gandini with a total of 9,000 long tons of premium from Singapore is scheduled to arrive in Tanjung Perak. Therefore, theoretically, supplies will return to normal on Wednesday."
Asep said that illegal hoarding is unlikely. "We'll monitor the market very carefully." (nur/sur)