ISLAMABAD: Petroleum Minister Omar Ayub Khan while defending the government’s decision to raise the price of all petroleum products, said despite the latest rise in rate, the petrol price in the country remains the lowest as compared to other countries in the region.
Addressing a press conference with Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Petroleum Division Nadeem Babar, he said that prices in the international market had risen by 112 percent over the last 40 days.
Ayub said petrol prices in South Asia as of Saturday stood at PKR180.86 per litre in India, PKR174.86 per litre in Bangladesh, PKR143.86 per litre in Sri Lanka and PKR143.31 in the Maldives.
Furthermore, the price of petrol in Nepal stood at PKR131.62, and in Bhutan petrol was available at PKR108.40 per litre, he added.
On this occasion, Nadeem Babar explained that the government set the prices of petroleum products on the basis of Pakistan State Oil’s (PSO) monthly average. Babar said that Pakistan had the lowest prices among South and Southeast Asian countries.
Giving an “example”, he said that on February 28, before the COVID-19 outbreak started, petrol was priced at Rs116.60 and diesel cost Rs127.24.
In the current month of June, the price was reduced by Rs 42. He added that the government, despite its “lesser purchasing power”, was trying to charge as less as it could.
Explaining unusual announcement by the new fuel prices on June 26 instead of July 1, Babar said that according to calculations, if the “last cargo was priced at the current rate, there would be an increase of Rs 31-32”.
“We didn’t want to do this,” he said, adding that by increasing prices now, the government had condensed the total raise by spreading it over 35 days.
“This means all the oil marketing companies (OMCs) will also face a slight loss in July [but there will be] net benefit for consumers,” he added. Referring to the oil crisis, he claimed that the cause behind it was “hoarding by certain OMCs in the country”.
Babar said, “Currently, there are 9,000 legal registered petrol pumps, which means they sell oil at some OMC level whereas there are 1,500 or more illegal pumps that have no agreement with any OMC. The government will crack down on these with severe punishment, he warned.
“Because the price had risen to very high levels in the international market and the price here was very less, companies started hoarding.
He said authorities will change rules and laws and take administrative action against illegal pumps. “It is unfair that the government cannot provide relief to the people when it wants to, “he said.
Omar Ayub criticized the PML-N leaders and alleged that when an investigation was started during the PML-N’s term, the [then] finance minister called Investigation Officer Tariq Khosa to his office and asked him to stop the investigation.
“The PML-N gave protection to these mafias. On the contrary, the premier’s stance is to break the back of and end these mafias and to go to the very end to do so.”
In a sudden move on Friday evening, the government had increased the prices of all petroleum products by up to nearly Rs26 to share the impact of rising international prices with the consumers.
The price of petrol (motor spirit) was raised by a whopping Rs25.58 to Rs100.10 per litre from the existing Rs74.52, an increase of 25.6 percent.
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