Egypt offers food discounts after fuel price increase

Egypt’s military said it would use its buses to transport civilians and sell food at a discount amid concerns that a weekend decision to raise energy prices will fuel a surge in the cost of consumer goods.

The military will sell “ample quantities” of food products to help “alleviate the economic burden of the great Egyptian people,” spokesman Mohammad Samir Abdel Aziz said on his official Facebook page.

President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi raised gasoline prices by as much as 78 percent over the weekend to save a nation “drowning in debt.” The move has already led to increased taxi and minibus fares. It was followed by increases in cigarette and alcohol taxes.

Sisi’s decision to reduce subsidies without introducing measures to protect the poor from a possible acceleration in inflation will test whether the president has secured enough public backing after leading the ouster of President Mohammad Morsi a year ago. He takes on a subsidy system that successive governments have steered clear of tampering with for fear of a backlash in the impoverished nation. Subsidies consume about 25 percent of state spending in Egypt.

“No one likes to see higher prices, but we need to give Sisi a chance,” Nasser Ismail, a 32-year-old carpenter waiting to catch a morning minibus to work, said. “These are difficult times and difficult decisions need to be made.”