Last week, Mereb Gas a tanker owned by the HA.MA.ME.TE.E. (National Union of Eritrean Youth and Students, the youth affiliate of the ruling party, PFDJ), returned empty-handed again, after weeks of waiting around Port Sudan and Yemen. Mereb Gas has been ferrying to Yemen and Sudan to import gasoline to Eritrea.

In the past, the governments of Sudan, Yemen and particularly Libya had provided diesel oil relieving some of the shortage in Eritrea.  Sudan, in particular, had provided "gifts" to the regime for its role in brokering a peace agreement with the East Sudan opposition, a group based in, armed by and trained by the Eritrean dictatorship. 

The hardest-hit by the shortage are the ordinary citizens who use liquefied petroleum gas for cooking.

The shortage of gasoline has affected the supply of electricity: the brown-outs and black-outs have increased in frequency and duration, making the work of the light industries, like bakeries, very hard.

Meanwhile, the government has intensified its �your money or your children� campaign. All parents have been sent letters from the Kebele [neighborhood surveillance centers] requiring them to provide documentation from military bases proving that conscript-age children are serving in the armed forces.  Parents who fail to account for the whereabouts of their children have to serve jail terms or pay a fine of 50,000 Nakfas.