NPA should have reduced fuel prices by 50% – OccupyGhana

General News of Saturday, 3 January 2015

Source: citifmonline.com

Sydney Casely Hayford Economist

Pressure Group OccupyGhana is asking the National Petroleum Authority (NPA) to publish how it arrived at a ten percent reduction on petroleum products.

According to the group, the explanation by the NPA for the reduction is not enough.

Government on Wednesday announced a 10 percent reduction in fuel prices after incessant pressure from various political and pressure groups.

A press statement issued by the NPA indicated that the decision to review fuel prices forms part of efforts to “reflect falling prices of petroleum products on the world market.”

It further explained that the decision takes a balanced position of continuous effort to “reduce outstanding under-recoveries to the BDCs.”

However, the group is insisting the NPA should have passed on a 50 percent reduction onto consumers.

A member of OccupyGhana, Sydney Casely Hayford, said it will write to the NPA to demand answers as to why it decided to reduce fuel prices by just 10 percent before taking further action against it [NPA].

“…We will ask the NPA to disclose publicly the entire mechanism through which it calculated and arrived at the 10 percent reduction. We think people have a right to know, they should tell us…,” Casley Hayford stated.

“…we are also going to ask them to tell us how the tax was applied because most of the levies that were applied to the ex-refinery price are already statutorily defined levies per act of Parliament so they have to explain why we are having to pay double of what we already have..”Casley Hayford added.