GIZA, Egypt — Husniyah Abdelfatah stood in a long line of more than 300 people — most of whom were women — that stretched along the narrow alleyways and streets of the Kardasa neighborhood in the Giza governorate. This woman in her 30s carried an empty gas tank and waited for more than five hours to get it filled from the natural gas dispensing warehouse, but to no avail.

As noon approached, Abdelfatah told Al-Monitor that she had been waiting in front of the warehouse since 4 a.m., in a line that did not end or move. No one managed to secure the sought-after refills. “All that we ask for is butane for cooking food and a fresh loaf of bread to eat. But there is no system in place to distribute gas tanks,” she said.

Boredom is accompanied by spates of violence, which is spreading through many Egyptian neighborhoods and governorates, leading to numerous casualties, as a result of the worsening shortage of butane gas upon which the majority of Egyptians rely as their primary source of cooking fuel at home.

The government tried to contain the butane shortage crisis by holding a number of meetings with experts from the Ministry of Petroleum and Ministry of Supply who were tasked with developing a scheme capable of remedying the problem through the implementation of a smart card system and the distribution of tanks to those citizens holding ration cards. The meetings also put in place administrative and criminal penalties meant to deter the trafficking of gas tanks on the black market.