KARACHI, Sept 1: The recent petroleum price-hike has drawn a sharp reaction from transporters, as well as politicians, who rejected the increase and termed it anti-people.
The Karachi Transport Ittehad, a transporters’ body, has hinted at launching a nationwide protest against the increase made by the Oil Companies Advisory Committee. It has also summoned an emergency meeting in Karachi on Saturday.
KTI chief Irshad Hussain Bukhari, in a statement, said that the Oil Companies Advisory Committee in a span of just eight months, since December 15, 2004, had raised petrol price by Rs 15.9 per litre and diesel price by Rs 10.22 per litre.
He said that there was no precedence in the 58-year history of the country of recent record-breaking oil price hike.
He warned that if this trend continued, there would be no need for calling strikes as vehicles would automatically be forced to remain off-road.
He said the transporters had earlier demanded that the Oil Companies Advisory Committee be made to review oil prices once in a year or at the most twice a year, but the government did not consider their just demand.
He warned that this time the Karachi Transport Ittehad would not confine its protest just to Karachi, but try to widen its scope to the national level. He said that this would be the main agenda of their meeting on Saturday.
The National Transport Ittehad, another body of transporters, has demanded immediate withdrawal of the hike, and said the transporters would decide about their future strategy in their meeting this week.
Meanwhile, the Alliance for Market Associations in Karachi, in a statement, strongly criticized the recent POL price hike, and termed it a non-serious attitude of the government regarding safeguarding the interests of masses.
SENATE BODY: Senator Rukhsana Zuberi, member of the Senate Committee on Petroleum and Natural Resources, expressed concern over increase in oil prices and said these are not linked with international prices.
She regretted that the recommendations of the senate sub-committee on oil price mechanism were not implemented despite a lapse of more than four months.
She maintained that the prices have artificially been increased by the oil companies in a manner that these are increased by $35 per metric ton by not adhering to Platt’s Oilgram prices.
She said detailed calculations indicate that the prices of HSD can be reduced by 25 per cent and of other products by 20 per cent if the additional factors/ duties added after 1999 are removed. In case of diesel, if Rs 7.84 charged extra is multiplied with the total consumption of 9.3 billion litres, the people of Pakistan are charged Rs 50 billion extra in one year, she added.
She also demanded an investigation into the matter why additional gains are given to the PSO.
PPP: The Pakistan People’s Party denounced increase in petroleum prices, and demanded an inquiry into reports of oil price manipulations.
Demanding withdrawal of the increase in the petroleum prices, it said that within barely two months, the Oil Companies Advisory Committee on Wednesday made an increase of nearly four rupees per litre in the price of petrol and nearly three rupees per litre in the price of diesel.
In a statement released by the Bilawal House, a spokesman of the party said that the price increase was a cruel joke with the people at a time when prime minister Shaukat Aziz has completed his one-year term.
When he took over as Prime Minister in August 2004, petrol was selling for Rs 36 and diesel for Rs 24 a litre, but now petrol price had soared to Rs 52 and diesel to Rs 34 per litre, he said.
“The increase in petroleum prices amounted to taxing the people and imposing a mini-budget on them and destroying the sanctity of the national budget” he said and added that prices of electricity, gas, agricultural produce and items of daily use would also increase.
When petroleum prices were increased on July 2, Prime Minister’s adviser on finance Dr Salman Shah had cruelly remarked that POL price rise would not affect country’s economy.
The spokesman said that rise in petroleum prices was not due mainly to international price fluctuations, but was mainly owing to manipulations by the vested interest.
During the last five years of Musharraf’s rule, tens of billions have been siphoned off by manipulations in oil prices to benefit the oil marketing companies and the vested interest, he said.
The private petroleum sector had placed its employees in key positions in the OCAC and enriched themselves at the cost of the poor people, he further said.
The spokesman asked the government to take the Parliament into confidence about the World Bank report on oil and gas sector released in July 2003 which had pointed out anomalies and bungling in fixation of petroleum prices.
The PPP demanded that the price increase be withdrawn and a thorough probe be conducted into reports that vested interests is involved in oil price manipulations.
MMA-MPAs: MMA MPAs have termed rise in petrol price anti-people, saying it would add to miseries of the common man.
In a joint statement, MMA MPAs Nasrullah Shaji, Hamidullah Khan and Younus Barai said the masses had already been suffering owing to the outcome of price hike, unemployment and poverty while the rulers, instead of giving any relief to them, were plunging them into further crisis.
They said people had been forced to commit suicides owing to increasing price-hike and poverty, while the rulers have turned a deaf ear to their sufferings.
NTI: The National Transport Ittehad on Thursday termed the recent hike in fuel price an anti-people decision and said that it would further compound the miseries of both, commuters and transporters.
In a statement NTI chairman Saleem Khan Bangash and others expressed concern over the state of affairs.
They demanded that increase in the prices of petrol and diesel be withdrawn to facilitate the masses, and the transporters.
TRADERS: The Alliance of Market Association Karachi chairman Atique Mir and other office-bearers said the recent hike in oil prices would shatter all dreams of economic progress and prosperity in the country.
They termed the recent hike a fatal blow to poor masses and stressed that all burden of price hike should not be shifted to them alone. They said there was a wide difference between tall claims of public welfare of the government and actual steps taken by it. They alleged that the government was implementing a plan that would further push the masses towards an abject poverty.
They feared that menace of ever-increasing price hike would force poor masses to commit en-masse suicides and crime ratio would break all previous records.
Pakistan Labour Bureau (PLB) also slated the raise in oil prices. PLB Pakistan Central Coordinator and veteran labour leader Habibullah Junaidi termed the hike a cruse for the poor and middle-class people. He said that it would further raise poverty and street crimes.
He suggested that instead of shifting the whole burden of rising oil prices to poor masses, the prime minister should cut down the size of his cabinet. He asked the government to slash all its non-productive expenditures.
The Haliqa Fikar-wa-Nazar Karachi also criticized the fuel price hike and termed it an anti-people.
Halqa Sindh President Dr Abdul Hameed and other office-bearers Mansoor Shaikh, Roshan Ara Begum, Ayub Abbassi, Mohammad Nizam, Saddiq Khatri and others charged that the tall claims of the government to give relief to the masses had proved a farce.
They demanded that the recent decision to raise fuel prices be withdrawn, henceforth. They said the masses would never accept this cruel decision.
Landhi Association of Trade and Industry (LATI) also flayed the hike in oil prices. LATI chairman Shahbaz Ali Malik, condemning the oil price hike, said the increasing fuel prices would further escalate production costs and trigger inflation.—Agencies
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