The grinding cement scarcity, which hit the provincial town of Farafenni and environs, has now entered its second month, resulting in significant revenue and job losses and stalled construction projects.
The conspicuous inability of Jah Oil, Salam and Gacem cement factories to catch up with the country’s soaring cement demand has now resulted in painful cement scarcities in both rural and urban Gambia. The prices of cement have also gone up significantly since the introduction of the Gambia government’s cement levy last year, jumping from D345 to D500 in some parts of the country.
The Barrow administration sometime last year introduced the cement tariff policy that saw the levy on a bag of imported cement increase from D30 to D180. The government said the overriding aim of the trade tax was to shield local cement producers from the might of big, wealthy foreign cement companies. At the time of the introduction of the tariff, most of the local cement importers were sourcing their stocks from Dangote, Sahel and Soccocim.
However, Jah Oil’s managing director Momodou Hydara has been leading media campaigns about the need to empower local cement producers and to protect them from established, wealthy cement companies. He also raised quality issues with cement from Senegal.
However, Jah Oil is now reportedly empowering one of the wealthy cement companies in Senegal as its cement tankers have since earlier this month “started to join the queue” at Dangote cement factory in Senegal to buy powder cement.
Jah Oil’s managing director Momodou Hydara could not be reached for comment.
The Cement Importers and Agents Association of The Gambia this week wrote to the permanent secretary at the ministry of trade Mod Secka to, among others, seek clarification on whether Jah Oil has also been paying the D180 levy that was imposed on a bag of imported cement.
At the time of writing this story, several cement stores in Farafenni were closed due to stock issues.
“I placed an order for 100 bags of cement since last month, but it’s yet to be delivered,” a prominent cement dealer in Farafenni, Alagie Touray, told JollofNews.
Touray, who is also the secretary-general of the Cement Importers and Agents Association of The Gambia, could not understand why the Gambia government should introduce a policy that would financially ruin the citizens and cause them other forms of harm.
“This cement tariff policy is not in the best interests of Gambians,” Touray asserted.
Meanwhile, the cement shortages in Farafenni, which have now become commonplace, have been seriously affecting the local economy as the income of many operators on the cement supply value-chain dwindled, forcing them into daily struggles to make ends meet.
In Farafenni, the cement business means a lot. It used to provide reliable income sources for truck owners and drivers, Cafe vendors, women petty traders, horse-cart and donkey-cart conductors and even the local banks.
