Calls persist to regulate the oil industry again

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — House Deputy Minority Leader Carlos Zarate pressed Congress on Sunday to pass a bill that would regulate the oil industry again and a bill suspending the excise on oil.

The opposition lawmaker from Bayan Muna blamed the Duterte administration for its failure to heed calls to regulate the oil industry for the past six years.

In a statement, Zarate said the armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia had pushed up oil prices to unprecedented levels, adding it was now imperative that the downstream oil industry be again placed under regulation to protect consumers.

He pointed out that deregulation had allowed oil price increases to go unchecked.

“With petroleum as a sensitive commodity, because price directly affects the cost of almost all other commodities and services, including essentials such as food, housing, social services, as well as transportation, deregulation has given transnational oil corporations even more leeway to influence the country’s cost of living, livelihoods, business and commerce, employment and the national budget,” he said.

Suspend tax on oil

Zarate and other opposition lawmakers have filed House Bill No. 4711, which seeks the regulation of the petroleum industry through the creation of a petroleum regulatory council, but the bill has remained pending at the House of Representatives.

“There is a pressing need to regulate the oil industry to protect the majority of Filipinos from current runaway increases in oil prices,” he said.

But he said regulation could only be effective and beneficial if it would be part of a program to institutionalize national oil industrialization “so that local oil prices can be brought down from unreasonable and unjustifiable levels set by giant transnational oil corporations.”

He said the Duterte administration had “wasted” the last six years to again regulate the downstream oil industry resulting in nonstop oil price hikes in the country.

“With the suspension of excise tax on oil as well as the unbundling of oil prices bill now still in limbo, the Duterte administration will leave a legacy of being callous to our peoples’ plight,” he added.

In November last year, the House ways and means committee passed a bill suspending the excise tax on petroleum products for six months, but it has yet to be passed on third and final reading.

In a separate statement, Bayan Muna chair and senatorial candidate Neri Colmenares renewed his call to suspend or slash taxes on fuel.

“As gas prices are now bordering toward P70 a liter, suspending the excise tax and VAT (value-added tax) can decrease the cost to a little over P51 per liter. That’s almost P20 of relief for every consumer,” Colmenares said.

RELATED STORY

Bayan Muna pushes for oil industry regulation amid Russia-Ukraine crisis