Gas shortage fuels anger among Iraqis

By Carol J. Williams and Samir Zedan
Los Angeles Times

	DAVID P. GILKEY / KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS Iraqis wait in line for more than six hours Sunday to reach gas pumps in Karrdah in southern Baghdad. A variety of problems are contributing to the most widespread fuel shortages in the nation since May.
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BAGHDAD, Iraq — As a gasoline crunch hit Iraqis in recent days, one motorist pulled out a gun and fired two shots in the direction of another car trying to cut in line at a station here in the capital.

In Mosul, to the north, a U.S. soldier was killed yesterday while standing guard at another crowded and volatile filling station. According to the military, four Iraqis in vehicles stopped approximately 50 yards away and opened fire.

Drivers in the central city of Karbala became so outraged at the sudden nationwide shortage at government-run stations that they set tires on fire to block access to a set of pumps and jeered the U.S.-led coalition until Polish troops stepped in to avert a riot.

To most observers, the mounting anger and unrest stirred by gas lines often snaking three cars wide and a mile long out of stations are seen as new evidence that the occupiers have failed to restore prewar services or social order more than seven months after Saddam Hussein's government fell.

Brig. Gen. Frank Helmick explained the shortage, which has materialized in the past two weeks, as a balancing act in the weeks leading to winter. There may be no shortage of gas, he said, but instead there may be competing demands for its distribution.

"The problem is with what we call the product pipeline," Helmick said. "More (gasoline) has been sent to Baghdad because of shortages there. The other issue is that trucks from Turkey, which bring in gasoline and diesel, are now being used to bring gasoline, diesel and kerosene for winter heating. There are only so many trucks, and now half of them are being used to bring in kerosene."

Asim Jihad, an adviser for the government's Oil Products Distribution Co., blames persistent problems with Iraq's heavily damaged electricity grid for power cuts that idle refineries, preventing gas producers from stepping up output to meet an expanding market.

But the return of long lines at the pump, a problem that plagued Baghdad drivers immediately after the declared end of the war in May, has been greatly exacerbated by enterprising car owners who are taking advantage of a disparity between the pittance charged for gas at the stations and the price many drivers are willing to pay to avoid a six-hour wait to tank up.

Thousands of jobless car owners are earning money by filling up and then siphoning the fuel into containers for friends or relatives to sell along roadsides at up to 20 times the official price of less than 4 cents a gallon.

"My father brings me the gasoline in his car, and sometimes we buy more from other drivers," explained Alawi Khalid, who mans one of the ubiquitous roadside pit stops for motorists too busy to spend a full workday filling their tanks. The elder Khalid idles away hours in line, fills up, then transfers the gas to his son's containers so he can quickly return to queue for a second or third daily refill.

The highest price the market seems willing to bear amounts to less than 80 cents a gallon, a bargain by comparison with U.S. or European prices but a relatively high price for Iraqis who, if lucky enough to be among the estimated 40 percent with jobs, on average earn less than $150 a month.

But the black market that has emerged over the past few weeks provides thousands of jobless men with incomes of at least $5 a day — about the same as those in government positions.

Some gas-station managers, although state employees, admit privately that they have been taking bribes from black marketers to sell them gas when their stations are closed.

The long lines, which coalition officials insist will be resolved in a week or so, also reflect higher demand for fuel from the slow growth of prosperity and the soaring number of cars entering the country as Iraqi exiles return. At least 250,000 more cars now ply the streets of the capital than before the April fall of Baghdad to U.S. troops, said Coalition Provisional Authority spokesman Dan Senor. "Black-market manipulations continue to be a problem," he said yesterday, adding that a recent strike among Turkish tanker-truck drivers hurt supplies around Mosul and inspired hoarding.

Coalition troops are being dispatched to drive away illegal roadside vendors, who so far have been running their itinerant filling operations without interference. The civilian authority also has issued orders to some of Baghdad's 105 gas stations to stay open around the clock to ease the backlog, Senor said.

Iraqi officials in the coalition-appointed Iraqi Governing Council and Cabinet bemoan the sudden return of aggravating gas lines despite what might be seen as encouraging upsides.

One could argue that the problem reflects an outbreak of entrepreneurial spirit, said Mouwafak Rabii, one of 25 members of the Governing Council. "But this is the ugly face of capitalism," Rabii said.

No one contacted from either the coalition or the government supported the idea of boosting the official price closer to the one being set by free-market forces, at least not at what remains a highly sensitive juncture in the campaign to restore Iraqi self-rule. Both coalition and Iraqi officials deem the crisis temporary and resolvable, but point to the risk of violent outbursts among long-suffering citizens sick of the postwar disruptions.

Material from the Chicago Tribune is included in this report.

Copyright © 2003 The Seattle Times Company