When Ramadan is turned into a month of speculation

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When Ramadan is turned into a month of speculation

Thursday, 02 September 2010 00:59

By Abdoulie John
The Holy Month of Ramadan has effectively become a bubble that makes the lives of Gambians harder as the prices of basic commodities go crescendo.
Not even the highly busy nature of Serrekunda market could eclipse the anxiety that grab the people’s mind confronted with the hard reality of seeing their day-to-day living taking a fearsome perspective. Serekunda_market

Taking into consideration the fact that demand for basic commodities increases during the one-month fasting period, unscrupulous business people have taken to the habit of subjecting prices into some absurd inflationist logic.
For Amadou Joof, a teacher living in Talinding, this is an issue that calls for urgent redress by the authorities.
“They have to set example by severely punishing those who are using a month of repentance as a tool for speculation,” Joof said in a revolted tone.
In fact, there is a prevalent public perception that prices of basic commodities inexorably rise during Ramadan and the common Gambian is left without any option than to accept this as a fait accompli.
“We are now use to it. Nothing can prevent shop keepers and wholesalers from increasing the price of sugar. The cup of sugar has now reached the point of D7.50, and with the sugar shortage it will go beyond,” Haddy Jagne, a housewife residing in New Jeshwang, told Jollof News. Like many Gambians, Jagne appeared resigned to the disturbing situation surrounding the sugar price inflation which is affecting so many Gambians.
Who to blame? While some shop keepers are holding wholesalers responsible for the sudden increase of prices of basic commodities, the latter are shifting the blame to the high level of taxes that they say continue to hamper their profits; a blame-game attitude that only aims at absolving those who are truly responsible for the current shortage of sugar and the daily sufferings of people as a result of skyrocketing prices.
In the view of Abdaiyu, a Mauritanian businessman who is running Gamfood Trading Ltd, a wholesale food store located along Foday Sillah Drive in Serrekunda, shopkeepers should do their level best to do business in line with the fundamental principles of Islam. “The wholesale prices,” he said, “have scarcely changed. For every 100 bags of rice, the unit price is as follows: D690 for a-50 kg American rice; D680 for a -50 kg Coppa Cabana bag of rice, while the price for the most demanded rice, Saddam, stands respectively at D810 and D420 for the 50 and 25 kg.”
Similarly, restaurant owners have also added their voice to the chorus of complaints. Fears abound that high prices of chicken wings will force menu prices up. “The circular flow of prices has even hit commodities such as a carton of chicken wings which has jumped from D350 to D440 while at the same time the tin of condensed milk has drastically moved from D35 to D45,” said Momodou Salieu Keita, a restaurant owner at the Bakau garage, in Dippakunda.
According to him, the only choice they are left with is to increase the price of cup of milk coffee.
“Nowadays, our customers constantly deplore the fact that we sell the cup of coffee with milk at D7.50 instead of D6,” Keita told Jollof News.
With the Ramadan approaching its end, there are growing concerns over these seemingly unending skyrocketing prices. Even if the market does not need to be regulated, businessmen without scruples need to be put into a position to understand that a quick money making system can only cause harm and sufferings to ordinary Gambians. For those who are chasing the devil’s tail, they only pray that Government will spare no efforts to make shop keepers respect the recommended prices.

Comments

0 #1 2010-09-02 11:16

These shortages are all as a result of bad and rogue policies of the Government- what happen to the tax-exempted produce of Kanilai firms? I thought that by not paying taxes Jammeh's firms should be able to consistently supply all our commodity needs at affordable prices. This government must get its acts together and start prioritising and helping the poor people, not to exploit our gullibility.

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