Oil companies reduce prices

AS global oil prices softened in last week’s trading, prices at Philip­pine oil pumps will be on rollback starting this weekend by P0.80 per liter for gasoline and P0.60 per liter for diesel.

The first company to jump the gun on competitors was Phoenix Petroleum Philippines Inc. which implemented price cuts at 12:01 a.m. yesterday.

Unioil, Petro Gazz, and Seaoil, which also reduced its kerosene price by P0.20 per liter, followed suit. These oil firms reduced prices from 2 p.m. yesterday to 6 a.m. this morning.

The rest of the industry players are anticipated to follow.

Dubai crude, which is the bench­mark for Asian oil markets, had eased to the $80 to $81 per bar­rel level last week from a higher scale of $84 per barrel the previous week.

For the Philippine oil market, however, as the Dubai crude was still staying at the $80 per barrel level, that is still considered a “criti­cal nib” because that is the pre­scribed trigger point on the suspen­sion of excise taxes for petroleum products in the country.

Pressure on Malacanang had intensified following 10 weeks of incessant oil price increases, but President Duterte was still blurry when it comes to his pronounce­ments on the recommended excise taxes suspension.

The Department of Energy has so far been helpless when it comes to that fiat, but it attempted seek­ing the imprimatur of the Joint Con­gressional Power Commission on the proposed termination of the oil excise taxes’ enforcement.

The Department claims credit on the discounts being extended to public utility vehicles, but in reality, that is a system with the oil compa­nies already in place as early as the time of the Aquino administration and had just been augmented by the subsidy provision under the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclu­sion Act.

The DoE, nonetheless, continued to sound off that it asked the Phil­ippine National Oil Co.-Exploration Corp. “to look into importing low-cost diesel to augment supply and offer a more affordable fuel option to our public transportation sector.”

The recommended importation of Euro-2 diesel, however, had been a proposal that even legislators staunchly opposed and forthrightly stated in front of Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi during his depart­ment’s budget hearing at the Sen­ate. (Myrna M. Velasco)