AfricaPress-Tanzania: A COUNTRYWIDE operation has netted dozens of retailers, wholesalers and super dealers after allegedly defying government’s order against hoarding and selling sugar at high prices.
The operation followed the Prime Minister’s directive to regional authorities to conduct inspection in their respective areas to identify and take legal measures against all culprits.
The police force in collaboration with the Sugar Board of Tanzania (SBT) carried out the operation in various parts of the country and nabbed dozens of sugar dealers as consumers continued digging deeper into their pockets to have the sweetener on their tables.
Speaking to the ‘Daily News’ yesterday, SBT Director General Prof Kenneth Bengesi said they have so far conducted the operation in six regions and insisted that the exercise was continuous.
He mentioned the regions as Dar es Salaam, Morogoro, Dodoma, Kilimanjaro, Tanga and Arusha.
“Several retailers, wholesalers and some super dealers are now under police custody and my officers in collaboration with the police are still preparing documents to take them to further legal measures,” Prof Bengesi explained.
However, he said details over the exact number of arrested businesspersons and the amount of impounded sugar in those regions would be known today since the board was still compiling the report.
“For instance, in Dodoma we found some dealers who were selling the sugar in secret. When you go and ask for the commodity they would tell you that they have empty stock, but later you find people coming out with bags of sugar,” he revealed, stating that generally the exercise was so far successful.
In Dar es Salaam, some retailers were still trading the sweetener at between 3,000/- and 4,000/-.
One of the traders, Ms Sauda Hamdani explained that they were forced to sell at that price to get profit because they bought the commodity from the wholesalers at the same price of 2,600/- per kilogramme.
An SBT officer, who led the operation in the Dar es Salaam city, Mr Achi Omari, said they discovered that a bag of 50-kg of sugar was sold at 135,000/- instead of the indicated price of around 90,000/-.
“We have seen traders hoarding even locally produced sugar as they create a shortage of the commodity for their benefits,” Mr Omari stated.
When Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa issued the directive on Wednesday, last week a kilogramme of sugar was trading at between 3,000/- and 4,500/- at retail price.
The premier ordered Regional Commissioners to take actions against the defiant traders who continued selling the essential commodity at high prices contrary to the government’s indicative price.
Mr Majaliwa argued that there was no reason for the sugar price to go up because there was enough sugar in the stock and another consignment had been imported.
Two days later, the Minister for Agriculture Japhet Hasunga and the Minister for Industry and Trade Innocent Bashungwa, pegged indicative retail price for Dar es Salaam region at 2,600/- per kilogramme.
Other regions like Arusha, Kilimanjaro, Manyara, Tanga, Morogoro, Coast the indicative retail price was 2,700/- per kg.
