The Government of Ghana in June 2015 put in place a deregulation policy that had the expectation of allowing marketers and importers of petroleum products to set directly their own prices based on import parity costs, taxes, and margins.
However, the Executive Secretary of the Chamber of Petroleum Consumers Ghana (COPEC Ghana), Duncan Amoah has said that the deregulation policy has only brought benefit to the Government and not the populace and as such the policy needs to be reviewed.
Speaking in an interview with Samuel Eshun on the Happy Morning Show, he explained: “Up till now the benefits we derive from the deregulation is that the country has distanced itself from fuel pricing. The government does not come into debt through the subsidies it places on fuel prices because it has been deregulated.
Today if you go to the market, you will get different prices from different oil companies which have not been of benefit to the ordinary person. If you own a car, you may have the option of where to buy your fuel. But the public transport operator does not have that option.
So you cannot quantify or see the real benefit to the ordinary Ghanaian. This is because transport fares are across the board. For example, if the fare from Madina to Legon is GH₵1.00, it is the same price for everyone although someone may buy their fuel at a lesser price than the other.”
He added that the deregulation system had created disparities both in pricing and quality of fuel and that has been of no benefit to the end-user.
Duncan Amoah advised that there needs to be a solution that will allow an average market price for everyone to benefit from.
“I think we will have to have that conversation another day on whether we are to continue with the deregulation or we find a solution so that we can have average market pricing for everybody so that we strike out the dynamics and help everyone in the country”, he added.
By: Alberta Dorcas N D Armah