Senators urge oil firms to implement big rollback

MANILA, Philippines – Senators called on oil companies again yesterday to give the public a one-time, big-time rollback on pump prices, following the steady decrease in crude oil prices in the world market.

Senate Majority Leader Francis Pangilinan said Shell, Petron and Caltex or the Big Three must lead in granting consumers the big rollback, “considering their recovery from the price increase a few months back.”

Pangilinan, along with Senators Manuel Roxas II, Loren Legarda, Juan Ponce Enrile and Ramon Revilla Jr., had asked why oil companies were quick to increase their prices, but slow to reduce them when global oil prices go down.

He even called for a 48-hour boycott of the Big Three oil companies in the country last month for their refusal to lower their prices despite plummeting prices of world crude.

Enrile, for his part, threatened to slap oil firms with excess profit tax should they continue to refuse to be transparent in their pricing and granting of price rollback.

Revilla also filed a resolution calling on the Department of Energy to crack the whip on oil companies that refuse to roll back their prices.

Roxas, chairman of the Senate trade and commerce committee, said a review of price movements in the Philippines indicated that prices had not been going down as fast as they were in the Asian/Dubai oil markets, where the Philippines sources most of its crude oil imports.

While prices in the Asian/Dubai market went down in August 2008 by an average of 13.89 percent, comparable pump prices in the Philippines went down only by 6.78 percent.

In September, crude oil prices went down by 11.9 percent, but local pump prices decreased by only 5.46 percent.

This month, pump prices in the Philippines have gone down by an average of 7.7 percent as against a drastic 32.58 percent drop in crude oil prices in the Asian/Dubai oil markets.

“This is a big sin committed by (Energy) Secretary Angelo Reyes to our people. Why can’t he force the oil companies to open their books so we can see if they are charging us fairly?” Roxas said.

“It seems Secretary Reyes is more afraid of offending the oil companies than the Filipino people. Or is Malacañang also more afraid to open the books of these giant companies?” he asked. – Aurea Calica