After seeing yet another zero dollar allocation for fuel this week we were wrong to conclude that the Zimbabwean government was giving up on its Zimbabwean dollar fuel promise. Just over a week ago the government announced that they wold be selling for in Zimbabwean dollars again and they would set aside several service station to do this. It seems they were serious as the Zimbabwe Energy Regulatory Authority announced that they would start selling fuel in Zimbabwean dollars in state media yesterday.

Looking at the sentiments of the people we do stakeholder engagement, we are in the process of rolling out outlets to sell fuel in RTGS starting with 57.

This is a directive from the government, we understand the arbitrage opportunity with coming with this two-tier pricing so we have started as a pilot and their look at large scale.
At the same time, we look at not affecting the supply chain.
ZERA’s statement.

Fuel prices have been going up globally with the U.S president being forced to use the country’s secret fuel reserves to try to ease the pricing. Biden also urged his countrymen to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels.

A foolish venture?

Selling fuel in ZWL at such low prices is bound to fail. The proposed price of 57 ZWL is even lower than the ridiculously low prices set by ZERA for fuel every month. Filling stations were unwilling or unable to sell fuel at these prices because they deemed them to be too low. This price is so low its difficult to see how this is going to work without being thwarted by cartels and the black market where the fuel will no doubt be diverted. We can already see how this is going to go. There will be a spriited effort from the government to push this venture before it fails spectacularly and they will eventually give up on this.