|
THE
government needs to maintain a mechanism that ensures
adequate oil supply in the country should it proceed to
sell its remaining 40-percent stake in Petron Corp.,
estimated to be worth P25 billion, Sen. Mar Roxas II
said over the weekend.
In a
statement, the senator stressed that the sale of Petron
shares must be “transparent and open to public scrutiny”
to avoid another discredited privatization scheme.
Another
lawmaker, however, is of the view that the sale of the
remaining Petron stake should be held. Rep. Lorenzo
Tañada III of Quezon province said the government needs
to “establish benchmarks on oil pricing, and the best
way to do it is by being in the business itself.”
Roxas
noted that the Asset Privatization Council has cleared
the way for the Department of Finance to sell the
40-percent stake in Petron before year-end to lower the
budget deficit.
In the
face of a financial firestorm sparked by the meltdown of
Wall Street investment giants, he insisted that “the
government must assure Filipinos it can deal with any
oil-supply problem, including securing adequate supply
agreements with friendly oil-producing countries like
fellow Asean members Indonesia, Malaysia and
Brunei.”
At the
same time, he warned that selling Petron would deprive
the government of control over the company,
traditionally seen as buffer to supply and price
manipulation by other players in the oil industry.
“The
government has to show the public it can deal with any
crisis, whether it be on oil supply or dealing with the
impact of the US financial crisis,” he said. He recalled
that earlier this year, London-based Ashmore Ltd.
acquired a majority stake in Petron from Saudi Aramco,
which had a 40-percent stake, and through tender offers
to the public.
Meanwhile, Quezon’s Tañada reiterated his earlier
position not to sell the government’s share in Petron
and even asked to buy the entire company back so that at
least one oil company is state-owned.
“Of
course, we must also make sure that those who will be
appointed to the Petron board will not milk the
company,” he said.
Tañada
also strongly urged the Executive to review the
oil-tariff adjustment scheme immediately to make oil
prices affordable to the people. Instead, he called for
the passage of the Antismuggling Act as one measure to
raise the needed revenues.
“It
seems the automatic tariff adjustment based on trigger
prices does not [consider] the translation into domestic
prices of oil products. It simply relies on the movement
of world crude oil prices or its overall impact on
consumer prices. We’ve had a series of oil-price hikes
this year and while there were rollbacks, the people
have yet to recover from the spate of price increases
not just on oil but on other commodities, as well,” said
Tañada, member of the House Committee on Energy.
“Because
of the adjustment scheme, the oil tariffs were
immediately raised from zero to 1 percent because of the
slipping world prices.”
In
pushing for the passage of the Antismuggling Act, Tañada
said, “About P150 billion is lost due to smuggling
annually. Manufacturing companies close and, as a
consequence, jobs are lost due to the entry of smuggled
goods.” These are compelling reasons, he said, for the
government to give priority to the measure. |
