Fuel crisis ordeal

The dictionary says a crisis is a time of intense difficulty or danger,an apparent of the last five days regards fuel in Botswana or at least the major city, Gaborone!

Word has it a certain voice note was circulated by WhatsApp of an impending fuel shortage for a coming few days, starting on Saturday 27th of June,sending people in a frenzy,leading to a weekend of pandemonium. At the start of this I was working away from home the morning,and as traffic piled up on the roads I put it to month end madness and everyone out doing their shopping,until I was caught up in traffic for over two hours making me late for a brunch meeting.

All roads that Saturday were car packed and worse off at intersections that lead to gas stations leading to a grid lock of cars and frustrations to those caught in fuel traffic unawares,like me.

I sighed, I called folk,I lamented to friends on the phone sitting in unmoving traffic. The Ministry of Energy that same afternoon released a statement nullifying the allegations,but the fuel queues grew instead. The government said there was no such but the fuel stayed not enough instead. Must I worry? I wondered. I thought to myself, surely the government will not let us go without fuel for days,can it?

Someone retaliated ‘Remember this is the same government whose plan you don’t know about the pandemic we’re in the middle of?’ Another quipped “The same government that has left our parents pensionless? I can’t put that past them”.

I call my friends conspiracy theorists,even where things are apparent. I am not sure if it’s a way to protect oneself from the glaring and scary truth or it’s foolishness. Monday morning most gas stations did not have fuel and had big red cones at entries to stop cars from wanting to wait the fuel trucks said to be stuck at the border. Queues for fuel at the few stations with fuel were getting longer and crazier. Stories were unending about what could be going on,some far fetched,some leaked,some crazy but all not yielding a need; fuel!

On Tuesday morning at wee hours of the morning,3 am to be exact a friend of mine told me she was sitting in a mad queue at a gas station where now everyone had gone to queue up at when word was leaked their refueling truck was at the border. Sigh! It was a cold night,but see people braved this cold and sat in cars over six hours and not even knowing if what they have heard about the truck is true. I asked each hour what the progress was and each time it was “we wait,in hope”!

Do you know that still on the day the government of the Republic of Botswana had not come to say what the issue was and what would happen as queues and people’s anxiety grew with the hours. There was a statement that said all will normalize in two to three days.

Who says in two to three days? Shouldn’t that worry you reading that even the government has no idea how long this will take,a whole government. A big red flag. The same government for as long as this madness is  ongoing is refusing that there is a crisis.

Some people judged those who queued up and said they were making the situation worse. I watched their opinions and updates change with each passing hour and with each drying gas station and each growing fuel queue. 

Some likened the situation to the toilet paper frenzy in other parts of the world at the start of the pandemic. Fear and panic are buddies and when put together they remind me of particles and molecules is science laboratories in high school,uncontrollable!

Thursday 02.07.2020 some gas stations still don’t have fuel,queues for fuel in some still remain snake like,it has been five days. This is not a normal and it has gone on for five days and it is not a crisis still? Interesting!

I,on my own would call it a fuel crisis.

I am no economist.

I am not expert of nothing.

I am a citizen on Botswana and there is a fuel crisis presently in the country.

Hopes and Dreams Turn Into Goals When We Decide To Take Action And Set A Deadline!!!!!      “CARPE DIEM- SEIZE THE DAY”