Thursday, April 20, 2017

Walking past miles of gridlocked cars in Egypt

The National: "Not just priority, the lack of local public transport should be put at the level of a national emergency: the inability to move efficiently around cities is stifling economic growth, generating the destruction of vast tracts of agricultural land and historic buildings and causing severe hardship to the country’s citizens.
....There can be no good reason to need over an hour to drive a kilometre or two through the centre of the city. I have walked for miles while passing cars, buses and lorries stalled in traffic. It’s maddening that it can be quicker to walk across town than to go by car. The gridlock likewise hinders goods and spare parts from reaching markets, at great cost to the economy as a whole."

Tuesday, April 18, 2017

KRG running up huge debt while workers go unpaid

Rudaw : "I also highlighted the KRG’s growing debts and the huge gap that has accumulated between the KRG’s revenues and expenditure over the last 6 years. I warned that if the KRG carried on as before with its uncurbed spending and without real reforms, then even if we reached 1 million barrels of crude oil production per day and oil returned to $100 per barrel we would still not cover our financial requirements."