Fuel price increase unacceptable — PPP
The Progressive People’s Party (PPP) considers the current increases in petroleum prices as unacceptable, unjustifiable, insensitive and suffocating.
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The government, through the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), announced a nine-per cent increment in petroleum prices over the weekend.
According to the NPA, the price increase has been necessitated by the rapid depreciation of the cedi.
"These increases, as we see, are full-time recovery because we don’t want to incur any losses or any under-recoveries again…you also know that the cedi has seen some depreciation in the period under review. And these three factors are what have caused the price to be increased to nine per cent,” explained the NPA.
But in a statement, the PPP National Secretary, Mr Kofi Asamoah-Siaw, said the government of Ghana refused to reduce fuel prices by the same measure when the world price for crude oil dropped in the last quarter of 2014 for about 50 per cent from US$120.00 to less than US$50.00.
“When this happened, the government of Ghana, per His Excellency President Mahama, indicated that the windfall should be reserved or saved against future increases in the prices on the world market,” it stated.
The PPP said the depreciation of the cedi and the consequent foreign exchange losses experienced by the Bulk Oil Distribution Companies(BDCs) were the direct consequence of the mismanagement of the economy by the government.
It is, therefore, unthinkable for the government to worsen the current situation by transferring the losses to Ghanaians, the PPP added.
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It further pointed out that “We can no longer pay for the inefficiencies and incompetence of the government,” adding that, “It would be better for the President to resign than to continue to punish the people for giving him an opportunity to govern and make life better and comfortable for us all.”
According to the PPP, “We are now at the mercy of dumsor which has caused considerable harm to businesses and individuals in terms of high cost of doing business, investment losses, collapse of industries and small businesses and loss of thousands of jobs.”
This dumsor, the PPP said, was also caused by the same government’s inability to produce enough energy to support the economy. -