Fuel price hikes: ‘We believe Terkper won’t deceive Parliament’

The Chairman of the Finance Committee of Parliament, James Avedzi has defended a decision to approve the Energy Sector Levies which led to the increase in prices of fuel products in the country saying they believed the information presented to them by the Minister of Finance, Seth Terkper was credible.

“We believe the minister that the information he is providing to us is the correct information and that is what we used,” he added.

Mr. Avedzi explained that “the minister did not ask us to accept a percentage increase in the ex-pump price, he asked us to approve specific levies and the reasons were justified in the memorandum attached to the bill and the Committee and Parliament were satisfied with those justifications.”

Many Ghanaians have criticised a decision to increase fuel prices at the pumps by between 22% and 27% following the passage of the Energy Sector Levy (ESL) by Parliament in December 2015.

A report by the Parliamentary Select Committee on Finance revealed that Parliament approved a 5.18% increase for the price of petrol, 2.90% for Gas Oil and 1.74% for LPG.

Meanwhile, Parliament had subsequently resolved to drag the Finance Minister and the Chief Executive Officer of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA) before it for furnishing the House with supposed misleading information in the passage of the controversial energy sector levy.

Speaking on Eyewitness News, James Avedzi insisted that though the bill was brought before Parliament under a certificate of urgency, they still did due diligence to it.

“There was no way the Committee would have been able to do that work because we do not have all the parameters. I said earlier that, determining the ex-pump price of a petroleum product is a formula and that formula was not given to us. So we asked the ministry to put these figures into the formula and give us the results. So we did due diligence by asking them to provide the information pertaining to the formula.”

When pushed further by host of Eyewitness News Richard Dela Sky, Mr. Avedzi said “I don’t think that you want me to say whatever the minister is bringing to Parliament is not the true position…We know that they are people of substance and people who hold high positions and therefore when information is provided to the committee it’s the right information. So you cannot fault the Finance Committee.”

“…don’t forget that this was done under a certificate of urgency that we should take all the bills through all the stages within a day,” he added.