Fuel price hikes are the talk of the town
Friday’s fuel committee decision to hike prices and the start of the 2021-2022 academic year were the top two talking points on the airwaves last night. We have the full fuel story in this morning’s Energy section, above, but here’s what the talking heads had to say:
The government had previously been selling petrol at a loss, Oil Ministry spokesperson Hamdy Abdel Aziz told Ala Mas’ouleety’s Ahmed Moussa (watch, runtime: 19:26). Friday’s EGP 0.25 price increase brought the price at the pump back up to cost, Abdel Aziz noted, emphasizing that local fuel prices are still among the lowest in the world. Al Hayah Al Youm’s Lubna Assal also had Abdel Aziz on the phone (watch, runtime: 7:40), while Moussa, highlighted Supply Minister Aly El Moselhy’s comments that the fuel price hikes won’t translate into rising commodity prices (watch, runtime: 3:15).
The second most popular theme on the airwaves was the start of the academic year. Assal devoted a large segment to an interview with Ain Shams President Mahmoud El Meteiny (watch, runtime: 20:56) while Moussa spoke to Higher Education Minister Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, who noted that life on university campuses is returning gradually to its pre-covid conditions, and that there are now some 1.2 mn jabbed students (watch, runtime: 16:20).
Over on El Hekaya, Amr Adib took a particular interest in Lebanon, which saw a massive power outage as state-owned electricity plants were forced to shut down yesterday due to severe shortages of fuel imports (watch, runtime: 3:30). We have more on this in Around the World, below.