Daily Times

Chairman Oil Marketing Association of Pakistan (OMAP) Tariq Wazir Ali on Wednesday congratulated Prime Minister Imran Khan and the government of Pakistan for adopting right approach towards setting the prices of petroleum products and issue of Price Differential Claim (PDC) and undo the course on PDC as this timely action has averted a major setback and developing fuel shortage.

In a statement, Chairman Tariq Wazir Ali said that the global cost of oil has been consistently rising, having reached about $83 per barrel of Brent unrefined, as the world’s economy recuperates from the Covid-19 lull. He added that Federal Government dismissed Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA’s) proposed fuel cost increment that was normal on 1st November. OGRA had proposed to build the retail cost of gas by Rs 10.73 per liter, and Rs 7.70 per liter on diesel.

The Chairman further observed that the government appropriately needed to shield buyers and the economy from rising global oil costs, and subsequently dismissed OGRA’s proposition. Rather they concocted a system to basically sponsor the expanded expenses for the end client; Oil Marketing Companies would name the above increment as a “Price Differential Claim (PDC)”, a sum that OMCs might have later guaranteed from the Government as a discount. The issue is that the Federal Government has as of now founded such a PDC before they actually have not completely discounted organizations’ PDC sums that was charged as much as 13 years prior, he added.

He went on to say that the government’s well-meaning goals last year, when they restricted fuel imports to secure Pakistan’s oil purifiers, precisely when oil costs were at a memorable low, were misguided and in the end prompted genuine harm to the whole economy when in June 2020 there was a cross country fuel deficiency. The purifiers whined to the public authority that they had bought oil at a lot greater costs, and that they required security from the falling worldwide oil costs, he said adding thay Petrol Refiners, and the oil business as a rule, are generally shouting that the business needs liberation.

However, purifiers looked amazingly two-faced in 2020, when unregulated economy standards were dismissed by them to shield them from lower costs which might have essentially advantaged the everyday person and the whole Pakistani economy, Chairman OMAP explained. He said, “Then, at that point, in May, the public authority persuasively brought retail costs down to where pretty much anybody in the oil business would sell beneath their expenses. The outcome? Pakistan’s cross country fuel lack of June 2020. What’s more, the equivalent might have been gotten under way by the public authority again with the PDC.”

Tariq Wazir Ali further recommended, “Honestly, the government should allow the market forces to set on the fuel prices in Pakistan and should allow market players to contest on prices. This will help the normal Pakistani and the economy in general, as it will drive down the cost and permit natural selection administrators. Shortcomings will properly be rebuffed. Any other way, even having good intentioned goals could wreck progress and will prove harmful for the entire petroleum industry as the OMCs are already facing a liquidity crunch.”