In an incident repeated within a single week, the cars of three citizens broke down after being filled with petrol from different stations in Cairo, amid growing doubts about the quality of the fuel in circulation, especially the 95-octane grade.
Mohamed Zaki, a Cairo resident, was surprised when his car suddenly stopped shortly after he had filled it with petrol at a station belonging to the National Service Projects Organisation on the New Street road near the Ring Road. The maintenance technician told him that the fuel pump, which is responsible for pumping petrol to the engine, had burnt out because of unusual heat. After he replaced it with a new one, the same problem returned the next day, which forced him to clean the petrol tank and change the pump again within the same week, incurring additional expenses.
The same thing happened to a Mercedes C180 owned by Ahmed Sabry. His sister had used it a few days earlier and the car stopped with her after being filled with 95 petrol at a station in the Madinaty area. “They told me the pump had burnt out because of the petrol,” says Ahmed, who paid EGP 25,000 for the spare part but did not file an official complaint, convinced that he “will not get compensation”, and he preferred to take his two cars off the road temporarily until the causes of the problem become clear.
Haitham Mourad, the owner of a 2010 Skoda Octavia, faced the same fault after filling his car with petrol at a station in Gisr El-Suez, rather than at his usual station in the Heliopolis district. The engine suddenly stopped, and the technician discovered that the pump had been damaged because of a fault in the petrol system. “The technician told me the effect of the petrol was similar to 80 petrol,” Haitham explains, adding that a work colleague of his faced the same fault during the same week.
Despite the differences in stations and areas, the repeated failure of the same part in the three cars raises questions about the quality of the petrol in circulation at some stations, and its direct impact on vehicle safety and on the cost of sudden maintenance.
Over the past few days, a marked increase has been recorded in complaints by social media users in Egypt about sudden car breakdowns, which many vehicle owners have linked to the quality of the petrol in circulation. The posts published on platforms such as “Facebook” and “X” ranged from personal testimonies and pictures of faults to calls for the responsible authorities to be held to account, amid demands for government intervention to establish the causes of these breakdowns.
According to an analysis of the content of the digital posts, the earliest references to faults suspected of being linked to petrol date back to 5 May 2025, while their frequency peaked between 5 and 11 May. Hashtags such as #adulterated_petrol, #adulterated_petrol_in_Egypt and #car_breakdowns_because_of_petrol were repeatedly circulated, in the context of wide discussions reflecting a state of anxiety among a number of drivers.
Although most of the complaints came from Greater Cairo and Giza Governorate, Zawia3 also documented testimonies from drivers in other governorates, including Alexandria, Port Said and Qena. They reported that their cars or motorcycles had broken down after filling up with 92- or 95-octane fuel at different stations during the past week.
The faults mentioned ranged from damage to petrol filters, fuel pumps or external electric injectors, while some also pointed to problems with petrol intake or repeated engine stalling. A number of drivers expressed fears of their vehicles breaking down on motorways or in remote areas, which exposes them to additional risks and forces them to bear the costs of having their vehicles transported by “tow truck” to maintenance centres.
These breakdowns come less than a month after the Egyptian government announced a new increase in fuel prices, the fifteenth since June 2014. On 11 April 2025, the price of 95 petrol was raised from EGP 17 to EGP 19 per litre, an increase of around 11.7%. The price of 92 petrol also rose from EGP 15.25 to EGP 17.25, an increase of 13.1%. The increases also covered the price of solar (diesel), which rose by two pounds to reach EGP 15.50 per litre, instead of EGP 13.50.
Rising prices of petrol pumps
Around ten days ago, Ahmed Montaser, a car maintenance technician and the owner of a mechanics workshop in a district of Giza Governorate, noticed a large number of car owners flocking to his workshop because of sudden breakdowns. On examining the broken-down cars, he kept finding the same result: damage to the core of the petrol pump, as a result of carbon build-up in unusual quantities, as if the car owners had used 80 petrol instead of 92 or 95.
As the cases multiplied, Ahmed decided to test a sample of the petrol filled at some stations, and noticed that its smell was foul and unfamiliar, that it did not evaporate normally, and that it left black traces on the filters and pumps, which he attributed to an increased carbon content in the fuel. He pointed out that the damage was not limited to cars, but also affected the new motorcycle he had recently bought, whose engine broke down because of blocked fuel lines, causing it to stall repeatedly while riding. When he asked friends of his who own motorcycles, they confirmed that they had been facing the same problem for days.
Montaser tells Zawia3:
“Because of the large number of breakdowns caused by petrol, the prices of pump cores have risen over the past week. For example, the price of the petrol pump core for a 2021 Tucson (the popular-grade one) rose from EGP 1,250 to 1,500, while the imported version rose from EGP 2,000 to EGP 2,300. There is also a noticeable shortage in the supply of imported pumps on the market. The excess carbon in the petrol does not only damage the pumps, but may over time lead to weaker engine performance and reduce its efficiency in burning fuel.”
For his part, Ahmed El-Sorougy, sales manager at one of the French car companies operating in Egypt, confirmed that an unusual increase in sales of petrol pumps had been recorded at the company’s maintenance centres over the past ten days. He linked this direct increase to the appearance of faults caused by petrol, at a time coinciding with the current crisis.
The total number of licensed vehicles in the governorates of the Republic reached 10,410,000 vehicles at the end of 2024, compared with 9.95 million vehicles at the end of 2023, an increase of 4.7%, according to the Information and Decision Support Centre.
The responsibility of refining companies
Zawia3, spoke with businessman Ahmed Khaled, who owns a fuel station in the city of Zagazig, in Sharqia Governorate, and who completely denies that fuel stations are involved in any petrol adulteration, since petrol of all its different types reaches the stations in truck tanks filled at government fuel depots and tightly sealed with lead seals, which makes it impossible to tamper with them.
The fuel station owner asks: “Is it logical that all the owners of the fuel stations after which car owners suffered damage, once they had filled their cars’ tanks, agreed to adulterate petrol?”, stressing that the blame does not lie with the stations.
Meanwhile, Hassan Nasr, head of the General Division of Petroleum Products at the Federation of Egyptian Chambers of Commerce, affirms to Zawia3 that fuel stations in Egypt and the petroleum products marketing companies that own them, which number around ten companies, are completely innocent of the charge of adulterating petrol by mixing it with water, as some have spread on social media and in the media, holding the stations responsible for the crisis, which is due to a quantity of petrol that did not conform to specifications having been pumped to some fuel stations during the period from 4 May to 10 May, according to the results of the samples examined and announced by the Ministry of Petroleum, pointing out that responsibility for any fuel that does not conform to the standard specifications lies with the refining company from which it came and with the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation, and explaining that there are 6 petroleum refining companies, distributed between Cairo, Alexandria and Assiut, each covering specific areas, and that there are a number of governorates that recorded official complaints because of car breakdowns caused by petrol, half of which were concentrated in Cairo alone.
The head of the division warns that the flooding of the market with counterfeit car spare parts, car owners’ resort to cheap types of filters and pumps, their filling of their cars’ fuel tanks completely without leaving any breathing space, or their neglecting to refuel until the gauge lights up red, are the main reasons that compounded the problem and contributed to magnifying it, pointing out that the possibility of fuel stations resorting to mixing two types of petrol as a form of adulteration is slim, because modern cars display the octane level of the petrol on their screens, and the penalty for anyone who does so is severe, and considering that the crisis will end of its own accord once the quantities of non-conforming fuel run out.
Official data indicate that the number of fuel stations in Egypt reached around 3597 stations in 2019, and the number of operating stations belonging to the National Company for the Sale and Distribution of Petroleum Products is (255) stations. According to the Ministry of Supply, the largest number of fuel stations in Cairo is in East Nasr City and Maadi: Heliopolis has 16 stations, El-Nozha has 19 stations, East Nasr City has 33 stations, West Nasr City has 4 stations, El-Matariya has 3 stations, and Ain Shams has 9 stations.
Samples that do not conform to specifications
On Sunday, the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources revealed that a total of 870 complaints had been recorded nationwide during the period from 4 to 9 May 2025 regarding the quality of the petrol product offered on local markets, distributed as follows: 5 complaints on 4 May, 139 complaints on 5 May, 189 complaints on 6 May, 134 complaints on 7 May, 269 complaints on 8 May, and 134 complaints on 9 May.
Cairo Governorate came first with 429 complaints, followed by Giza with 208 complaints, Qalyubia 50 complaints, Sharqia 31 complaints, Alexandria 29 complaints, Gharbia 19 complaints, Menoufia 18 complaints, Dakahlia 12 complaints, Minya 12 complaints, Fayoum 10 complaints and Ismailia 9 complaints, while the remaining governorates saw a few complaints or none at all.
The ministry explained, in a statement, that 807 samples from various governorates had been analysed by teams from the Ministries of Petroleum and Supply, in addition to neutral analysis companies, and the analyses established that 802 samples conformed to specifications and 5 samples did not. In the Greater Cairo petroleum region, 250 samples were analysed by the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources and 205 by the Ministry of Supply, and two non-conforming cases were found, in Cairo and Qalyubia governorates; in the Alexandria petroleum region (Alexandria, Kafr El-Sheikh, Beheira, Matrouh), 136 samples were analysed, 73 of them by neutral companies, and all of them conformed to specifications except one sample; in the Suez petroleum region (Suez, Red Sea, South Sinai): 75 samples, all conforming; and in the Upper Egypt governorates: 68 samples, including two non-conforming samples in El-Fashn district – Beni Suef, and in Qena Governorate.
The ministry also announced the addition of a number of measures needed to ensure conformity with specifications. With regard to locally produced petrol, these consisted of refineries not dispatching any product for consumption until samples of it have been analysed in two different laboratories and the results matched, instead of analysis in a single laboratory; with regard to imported petrol, samples were taken under the supervision of neutral companies and analysed in three different laboratories, instead of one, to ensure the accuracy of the results; and with regard to the supply chain, analyses are carried out before and after the product is dispatched to verify quality along the entire supply chain, with neutral companies commissioned to carry out the analyses to guarantee impartiality. The ministry affirmed its full commitment to guaranteeing the quality of the products provided to citizens, while strengthening the inspection system in line with the newly introduced procedures referred to above, continuing inspection and monitoring activities and keeping public opinion informed of any developments relating to product quality, as well as its commitment to cooperating with the relevant authorities to hold accountable anyone proven to have failed to ensure the quality of petroleum products, in order to uphold the public interest.
In an earlier statement issued on 6 May, the ministry had announced the activation of the emergency room, which reviewed all local and international supply sources of the petrol product and the extent of their conformity with Egyptian standard specifications, reviewed the main storage depots, took and analysed samples from fuel stations nationwide, and also carried out an additional analysis of the sulphur content, affirming that it had counted the imported gasoline shipments unloaded at the ports of Suez and Alexandria during the period from 18 April 2025 to 3 May 2025, whose analysis certificates were reviewed and found to be in full conformity with Egyptian standard specifications, in addition to reviewing the analysis certificates of all petrol shipments produced locally by refineries during the same period, and the analyses established that the products conformed to Egyptian standard specifications.
It added that it had reviewed the analysis certificates of the intermediate depots supplying Greater Cairo and other governorates, and that all the results showed that the petrol offered for circulation conformed to Egyptian standard specifications, pointing out that the ministry had engaged internationally accredited sample analysis companies to take and analyse 116 samples from 42 fuel stations covering the Greater Cairo, Alexandria and Suez regions, provided that those stations included different geographical areas and stations belonging to various distribution companies, and the results of the analyses established that all the samples conformed to Egyptian standard specifications. Additional inspection committees were also deployed nationwide, and it pointed out that additional analyses of the sulphur content of petrol samples taken from depots and stations had begun on Tuesday, 6 May 2025, and that their results would be announced as soon as they were completed.
Speaking to Zawia3, Dr Hossam Arafat, professor of petroleum engineering and former head of the Petroleum Products Division at the Federation of Chambers of Commerce, considers whether petrol adulteration could be what is responsible for the sudden car breakdowns, given that there are around 6 million cars in Egypt and around 5,000 fuel stations, whose petrol tank capacity ranges between 23,000 litres and 45,000 litres, enough to fill the tanks of more than a thousand cars, a quantity that usually runs out within 48 hours, and that if the petrol at a given station were adulterated, this would mean that all the cars that took petrol from it would necessarily have broken down, explaining that petrol is adulterated in one of two ways: either by mixing it with water or by mixing different types of petrol, such as mixing 95 or 92 petrol with 80 petrol, considering that there is a state of irrational hysteria about the subject, and that there are electronic brigades seeking to tarnish the reputation of the fuel stations belonging to the National Service Projects Organisation, particularly the Chill Out station.
The head of the division attributes the car breakdowns to manufacturing defects or neglect of periodic maintenance, heavy reliance on “popular-grade” car spare parts imported from China, which have a short lifespan and lower quality, repeatedly driving the car until the fuel tank runs dry, or combining two or three types of petrol to save costs because of rising prices, attacking the Ministry of Petroleum’s statement, which acknowledged limited cases of collected petrol samples not conforming to specifications, according to the analysis of neutral companies, but did not name specific fuel stations or a specific type of petrol, did not reveal why the sample did not conform to specifications, and left out some governorates, considering it a statement aimed at calming public opinion and nothing more.
Misuse and neglect of maintenance
Engineer Gamal Askar, an automotive industry expert, explains to Zawia3 that Egypt has 80, 92 and 95 petrol, and that these numbers indicate the octane rating of the petrol, or the calorific value of the fuel, and that the higher the grade, the greater the purity, pointing out that there are types of fuel that contain a mixture of petrol and alcohol (usually ethanol), and that these types are commonly used in many cars around the world; as for ethanol fuel, the most common blend, E10, consists of 10% ethanol and 90% petrol, and is widely available in the United States, Latin America (especially Brazil) and some European countries.
To distinguish car pump failures caused by a fuel problem, the expert stresses that the maintenance technician must measure the petrol pressure in the pump, take a sample of the petrol and observe its colour and degree of purity, and whether there are additional substances such as sulphur and others, which lead to incomplete combustion of the fuel. To verify the quality of the pumps, their pressure must be measured at the car’s authorised service centre, using a pressure regulator.
Askar points out that low petrol quality affects the operation of the car’s engine, and with the compression of hot air the fuel does not reach its ignition point, noting that the cost of repairing car injectors and pumps is extremely high, as the price of the pump for some makes, such as Toyota, exceeds EGP 35,000, and adding that with good fuel, drivers and non-specialists can observe its degree of purity with the naked eye, and that if petrol in Egypt is compared with petrol in the Gulf states, we will notice that our purity is lower because of weak oversight, which causes damage to cars’ filters, pumps, injectors and the pipes inside them, as a result of the higher proportion of impurities.
Meanwhile, Counsellor Osama Abul Magd, head of the Automobile Association and deputy head of the Automobiles Division at the Chamber of Commerce, explains to Zawia3 that there is a problem related to petrol in Egypt, that there are complaints of a high lead content in 95 petrol, and that the Ministry of Petroleum has acknowledged violations at some fuel stations, but that this does not alter the fact that the wrong behaviour of some drivers has contributed to worsening the crisis.
Abul Magd points out that misuse and neglect of maintenance aggravate the faults caused by a problem with petrol quality, since some drivers of modern cars, produced in 2022 and later, resort to filling their cars’ tanks with 92 petrol without paying attention to the disastrous effects of doing so, while many car owners neglect to change the filters and leave their cars’ fuel tanks almost empty, and only head to the fuel station after the petrol gauge points to red, which leads to the lead impurities accumulated in the fuel tank being drawn in and damaging the pump.
Parliamentary interventions
Last Tuesday, MP Dr Maha Abdel Nasser, a member of the House of Representatives for the Egyptian Social Democratic Party, submitted a briefing request addressed to the Prime Minister, the Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources and the Minister of Supply and Internal Trade, regarding the recent increase in citizens’ complaints about the spread of many types of adulterated petrol at fuel stations, which had caused sudden breakdowns in their cars, especially in the fuel pumps, after they had filled up at different fuel stations, and about the appearance of oily spots or pungent smells in the petrol used, with citizens expressing fears that it contains harmful additives or thinners.
The MP affirmed that although the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources had denied the presence of adulterated petrol at fuel stations, the situation on the ground points to a real problem requiring urgent intervention, and it has become clear that there is a large gap between official data and citizens’ daily complaints, which raises question marks over the effectiveness of the current oversight system, pointing out that the methods of adulterating petrol have recently multiplied, according to the accounts and information circulating: some traders resort to diluting petrol by adding chemicals in order to reduce costs and increase profits at the consumer’s expense, use illegal devices to reduce the quantities of petrol delivered to the customer without changing the price, causing consumers to lose fuel they have paid for, and mix petrol with types of oils or industrial solvents that affect the quality of combustion and lead to the corrosion of the engine’s metal parts, warning that some believe certain stations obtain shipments of low-quality fuel at lower prices, then blend them and repackage them for sale at the price of regular petrol.
The MP called on the relevant authorities to tighten oversight of fuel stations, carry out periodic analyses of samples taken from the various stations and publish the results of these analyses transparently to the public; in addition, strict legal measures must be taken against stations proven to be involved in selling adulterated petrol, including closing the station and referring those responsible for it to the Public Prosecution, and we also demand that fuel distribution companies be obliged to provide quality certificates accompanying every fuel shipment that reaches the stations, and that those certificates be verified periodically.
In statements to Zawia3, MP Maha Abdel Nasser praises the statement issued by the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources on Sunday, as it represents an official acknowledgement by the ministry of an actual problem that affected a number of cars because of petrol that did not conform to specifications, but she points out that the ministry has not yet revealed the real cause of the problem, how widespread it is, or the stations and brands responsible for it, nor did its statement mention where the non-conforming samples were located and how they reached the market, and what measures the ministry will take in future to prevent this harm to consumers? And why did the relevant authorities not take them before?
The MP considers the value of the compensation announced by the ministry to be symbolic, and that linking compensation to the prior filing of an official complaint will greatly reduce the number of car owners who receive compensation, given that a large number of those affected did not file official complaints, calling on the government to reveal the full facts about the problem.
On Sunday, the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources had announced a decision to pay an amount equal to the value of the certified invoice for replacing the petrol pump, up to a maximum of EGP 2,000, to complainants who filed their complaint via the hotline (16528) or the website of the government complaints system, and that the ministry would contact citizens in turn, on condition that the complaint was submitted during the period from 4 to 10 May 2025 and concerns the same period, that documents proving the complainant’s ownership of the car are submitted, and that a certified invoice proving replacement of the car’s pump is submitted.
While experts and many owners of affected cars see the acknowledgement by the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources of the existence of 5 samples that did not conform to specifications as a positive step and the beginning of the road to solving the problem, many criticise the meagre financial value of the compensation announced by the ministry, which is not commensurate with the scale of the financial damage, and the fact that the compensation does not cover those affected who did not file an official complaint in time or did not obtain purchase invoices for the pumps, amid calls for the relevant authorities to tighten oversight of fuel stations, carry out periodic analyses of samples taken from the various stations, and announce precautionary measures to prevent a recurrence of the crisis.
