More than a week after the government placed stringent measures in a desperate move to rescue the South Sudan’s economy from a total collapse, the South Sudanese Pounds slightly regained some value against the United States Dollars and that is still holding, for now.
Not so much has changed, however. The South Sudanese Pounds remained at record low against Ugandan Shillings as mobile money transfer service providers peg SSP 1050 to UGX 6000, a steady rise from SSP 1000 to UGX 10000 two months earlier.
In the market, the government’s orders were not compelling enough for traders to reduce prices which rose dramatically when the local currency started losing value against forex.
Traders blame the government for poor policies and failing to regulate the economy, forcing the government to “ban all transactions in foreign currency”. But a vox pop conducted by The City Review last week shows citizens also lamenting the outbreak of natural disasters and its dreadful impact on economic growth.
Last week, the president of South Sudan Equatorial Chamber of Commerce together with the business community surveyed Konyokonyo market in Juba to assess its performance and establish the reason(s) why businesses suddenly hiked the prices of basic commodities almost two times the initial prices within a short period of time. Traders gave mixed reactions.
Susan Awan, a juice shop attendee called for further government intervention in what has become a free market economy. Awan earns SSP 1000 a day, the money covers her transport to and from work as well as food for the family.
“We are suffering so much, for instance, I work for someone else and earn 1000 South Sudanese Pounds per day. This amount of money includes transportation for coming to work and going back home.
“So, at the end of the day I spend SSP 400 just for transport without even lunch, and the balance is for feeding my family and now goods in the market are very expensive. At times the food I get for my family is not enough. I would like the government to intervene in this situation otherwise we are defeated,” she wailed.
Commercial food outlet Awadiya kamis reckon closure of the business as he is failing to cope with steadily high prices of food commodities.
“This is not the right way of doing business, we don’t even benefit at all, I am actually thinking of closing the business now. I used to buy 30 bags of bread at 30,000 SSP, yet before we use to buy one bag of bread at 30 SSP. So, this is not right and am not happy. Now we buy a chicken at 25000 SSP and yet we used to buy 1 piece at 15000 SSP only and I could make profit.
“I would like the government to talk to the business community to reduce the prices of goods in the market so that we can go back to how things used to be. You know I used to sell all my food and nowadays the food remains and I end up going into a loss,” he said.
Market guard Joseph Akuei said foreign business people are responsible for inflating the exchange rate and commodity prices in the market.
“My message to the government is, we do have a lot of issues, South Sudanese don’t have rights in their own country and foreigners have taken over the market increasing the dollar rate to over 35000. The government should intervene and stop this.”
Adollubage, a trader at Konyokonyo said they increased the prices when the dollar rate was high before the prices started dropping three days later.
