Consumers pay more for petrol, diesel due to Putrajaya’s pricing system, says PKR lawmaker
Market prices for RON95 and diesel have plunged to RM1.31 and RM1.39 per litre as of January 28 but consumers in Malaysia are still paying more, a PKR lawmaker said.
Apart from that, Pandan MP Rafizi Ramli said the government had also been collecting "hidden" fuel taxes, cashing in over RM1 billion since last month.
He said the people had been paying above market prices for petrol and diesel for the entire month of January because of the price fixing policy by the federal government.
The PKR secretary-general said that the price for RON95 and diesel on January 1 was RM1.75 per litre. This was after taking into account the cost and profit guarantees given by the government to fuel companies at 32 sen for RON95 and 23 sen per litre for diesel.
The price then dropped to RM1.63 per litre for RON95 and RM1.62 per litre for diesel on January 28, he said, but consumers were paying pump prices of RM1.91 a litre for RON95 and RM1.93 for diesel.
"Because the people are still paying prices higher than the market prices for unsubsidised fuel, Barisan Nasional (BN) is reaping profits by collecting fuel tax without telling the people," he said in a statement today.
Rafizi also explained the "hidden" petrol and diesel tax paid by the people using the estimated 14 billion litres of petrol and 9.64 billion litres of diesel used in a year, as stated by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak in Parliament previously.
For this entire month, he said the people paid RM307 million in petrol tax and RM209 million for diesel, meaning that the government had quietly collected RM516 million this month without the people's knowledge.
"Since the managed float system was adopted on December 1 last year until today, the government has collected RM1.149 billion from petrol and diesel taxes," he said.
For the average fuel prices for February, which would be announced tomorrow, Rafizi said the government should set the price for RON95 at RM1.62 per litre and RM1.65 for diesel without subsidy.
Should the government heeded the demand of PKR to subsidise fuel, the prices should be RM1.32 per litre for RON95 and RM1.35 per litre for diesel, he said.
"If the prices announced tomorrow are different, the related minister must explain how the prices for both types of fuel are calculated.
"We came up with these prices based on the same formula used by BN and the MOPS (Means of Platt Singapore) market prices," he said.
Rafizi also said Najib must explain the "hidden tax".
He said the government needed to set up a Fuel Price Stabilising Fund using the money collected from this tax, which could be used when the market prices were up again.
The government also needed to check the latest petrol and diesel market prices each week to avoid making the people pay more.
"The government must also order the fuel companies to sell petrol and diesel as consignment stock to petrol stations to avoid making losses each time the market prices change.
"We also urge the government to scrap the sales tax on fuel purchased by the industries and manufacturers, which was imposed beginning January 1.
“This had led to increase in cost, which kept the prices of goods up despite the drop in fuel prices," Rafizi said.
He added that until today, no BN leader had come forward to deny these issues, meaning that they were true.
"Imposing taxes on the people through fuel purchases when the national economy not in good shape is also showing that Najib's administration is getting financially desperate," he said. – January 30, 2015.
