The cost of municipal transport went up in Chechnya

Prices on public transport went up in Chechen Republic since January, 1. The residents of Grozny have to pay ten rubles ($0,3) for the ticket instead of the prior sum of seven rubles. Local residents are malcontent with the growth of the prices. Representatives of the Ministry of Transport say this is a coercive measure.

“The pensioners and students will be the first to bear damages from the growth of prices for it is mostly them who use public transport. Nobody knows why it was necessary to push up the prices so high”, resident of Grozny Zulay I. said to the “Caucasian Knot” correspondent.

“My pension is eight thousand rubles half of which covers payment for public utilities and the rest remains for me to live a whole month. Now the cost of public transport went up and they are going to do the same with prices on electricity, water supply and gas. How will we, pensioners, live further under such conditions?”, local resident Roman N. asks.

A representative of the Ministry of Transport, in his turn, states that the increase of prices on public transport was a coercive measure. “We have had rather low prices before and nobody wants and will not always keep them at the same level and work in fact at a loss for themselves. The increase of prices was certainly a coercive measure and this decision was taken based on the actual situation”, the representative of the Ministry says.  

Talking to the “Caucasian Knot” correspondent the mini-bus drivers said that such a gross increase of the cost of transport became unexpected for them, too. “Yesterday I had to listen to the complaints of people, mostly elderly ones, for the whole day. They expressed their discontent with such a great growth of transport prices. But it is not us who set the prices, it is the authorities. To be frank, we were displeased with this increase ourselves”, one of the drivers who preferred to remain anonymous said.