By Libya Herald reporters.
Tripoli, 23, October 2015:
Foreign residents as well all Libyans will be eligible for the monthly compensation for the removal . . .[restrict]of fuel and other subsides says the Libya Dawn government in Tripoli. However, it puts the figure at LD 50 a month, 20 dinars less than the monthly figure the Central Bank of Libya is working on.
It started work to implement a system of getting it to people a fortnight ago.
Five months after it announced the move, it has said “all Libyan families and single mothers, divorced or widowed, who are nursing the country’s children, as well as non-Libyans with permanent residency,” will be eligible.
This is the first time it has been stated that foreign residents will receive the money. Given that the payments are to be based on linking up to the computerised national ID number system, it is not clear how this will be effected.
The current petrol price is the equivalent of 150 dirhams ($0.11) a litre when the average world price is $1.06. The cost is due to be increased gradually, initially to between 200 to 250 dirhams a litre, and probably no more than 400 dirhams withinthe first year.
Ever since July 2013, governments have been threatening to abolish fuel subsidies. First it was Ali Zeidan and then a year later Abdullah Al-Thinni who vowed to do away with a grant that was effectively underwriting fuel smugglers to the annual tune of many hundreds of millions of dinars. But nothing happened until the Central Bank started working on imoplementing the idea this month. [/restrict]
