The Ghana Trades Union Congress (TUC) has frowned upon the recent petroleum products price hike, joining the host of other organizations and individuals who have already done so since the announcement.
In a press statement on the subject, signed by Kofi Asamoah, the Secretary General of the organized labour front, the TUC wondered why such an increase should be effected soon after the X’mas holidays and at the beginning of the year when, “Workers go through all forms of hardships. Why should government allow such price hikes despite the negative effects such increases can have on the economy, particularly on the competitiveness of local industries and their ability to create decent jobs for Ghanaians?”
They asked whether the government was unaware about the negative effects such price hikes, with the high tax components, could have on the national efforts towards poverty reduction.
The tax component in the price build-up, as presented by the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), the TUC mentioned, “Is too high, especially when you take into account the negative social and economic impacts of the astronomical increases in utility tariffs in the last half of 2010.”
This, alongside the recent increase in petroleum product prices, the TUC pointed out, suggested that the government was gradually losing its prerogative on economic and social policymaking.
“Such high increases in the prices of basic commodities such as water, electricity and now fuel smack of a high degree of insensitivity on the part of government to the plight of the ordinary Ghanaians, the majority of whom find it hard to meet their daily needs for survival,” the TUC lamented.
Since the announcement of increments in the prices of petroleum products, government has come under a barrage of attacks from a cross-section of Ghanaians, most of whom think, by his action, President Mills had reneged on his promise to drastically reduce such costs when he was campaigning for the presidency.