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CPC slips up on fuel
By Chris Kamalendran
The delay in ordering fuel supplies, failure to act against suppliers who delayed shipments and poor contingency plans during the temporary shut down of the Sapugaskanda oil refinery were to a large extent the causes for last week’s fuel shortage, with more expected in the weeks to come, CPC sources told The Sunday Times.

While some CPC officials including Chairman Jaliya Medagama blamed the media for causing the panic buying resulting in the fuel shortage experienced last week, other CPC sources confirmed that the Corporation’s failure in properly managing the stock situation led to the scarcity.

The refinery was shut down for six weeks from July 8 to allow for the annual maintenance work, but fuel shipments from India and the Middle East had been delayed.

Despite repeated appeals by CPC officials that there was no need to panic as ample stocks were available, petrol-shed owners in Colombo and the outstations confirmed that due to the fuel shortage the Corporation was not supplying them the usual quantities of fuel in keeping with their requirements.
Long queues of vehicles were seen at petrol-sheds waiting for the normal petrol at Rs. 80 a litre or in the alternative were forced to purchase the more expensive variety of petrol at Rs. 83 a litre.

In addition to petrol even diesel and kerosene shortages were reported from Colombo and the outstations. The CPC’s failure to ensure the availability of adequate stocks comes in the wake of a demand by the JVP affiliated trade union to investigate why no action was taken to prevent the short fall in supplies, the non-receipt of the quantities ordered from suppliers and the delay in shipments. These demands were put to the CPC as far back as April when a similar situation but on a milder level was experienced at the time.

CPC sources said the import plan had not been put in place and tender conditions were repeatedly violated by suppliers but no action had been taken against them. The sources said even though penalties could be imposed on defaulters it had not been done.

They said as a result of not taking action against suppliers for regularly delaying shipments of fuel to Colombo, the suppliers too took the clause on complying with time tables lightly.

The ship MV Szygi due from the Middle East on July 21 arrived six days later on July 27 but no action has yet been taken against the supplier and another ship due to arrive from India on July 31 arrived only on August 2.

CPC Commercial Manager N. Marasinghe said not only the delay in the arrival of stocks that caused shortages but also alleged that people purchasing larger than usual quantities of fuel and storing them was also partly to blame for the shortages.

“We will be opening the refinery in two weeks time, but if there are delays in the arrival of shipments there could be a similar situation”, Mr. Marasinghe said. He blamed the delays on the busy schedules of the shipping lines.

The Sunday Times learns that in December last year the CPC suffered a loss of Rs. 3 million due to the delay in the arrival of just one ship as this delay forced the CPC to issue superior quality petrol at the price of normal petrol.

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