Pakatan Rakyat solution for fuel prices ‘simplistic’
Subsidising food is a new issue. What about the Petronas money earlier, no accounts, and it is just guesswork what is done with it. Will we have new information now, and see where the Petronas money goes. Another doubt, does not lowering fuel prices benefit the lower income groups; the idea comes from the opposition and therefore it is simplistic, we are waiting for Shahrir to tell us how the Petronas dollars is going to be utilised. Exciting days are in store for us. Anil Netto, the blogger, has this.
The opposition’s election pledge to use profits from state-owned oil firm Petronas to keep fuel prices low is a “simplistic solution”, the Dewan Rakyat was told today.
“If we have RM10 billion, it is better we use it for (subsidising) food than for oil and diesel because it would at least ensure the lower income groups are benefitted from it,” Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister Shahrir Abdul Samad said.
He was replying to a supplementary question from Khairy Jamaluddin (BN-Rembau) during the question session this morning on whether the opposition’s pledge on using Petronas profits to subsidise fuel was a “populist” and “not realistic” approach.
In the run-up to the March 8 polls, the opposition parties have campaigned to prevent the Barisan Nasional from getting a two-thirds majority in Parliament by offering voters fuel cuts through the Petronas profits.
The government has also shot down the suggestion previsouly on the basis that the country’s oil and gas reserves will run out in three years.
In answering the Rembau MP’s original question earlier, Shahrir said the government will among others, introduce a measure to uniform the price of essential goods between the Peninsula and Sabah and Sarawak.
Khairy has asked the ministry whether it will introduce a new measure in tackling the issue of price hike for goods in line with the increase of world’s oil and food price to ensure that aids to the lower income group can be made effectively.
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