The first portion of the K1 billion fuel subsidy announced by Prime Minister James Marape is expected to be released by Monday next week and fuel prices are expected to return to their usual rates before the increase.
This was announced yesterday by Minister for Rural Economic Development, Joseph Lelang and Independent Consumer and Competition Commission (ICCC) Chief Executive Officer, Roy Daggy this afternoon in Port Moresby.
Lelang said the government is working to address the issue that is beyond our control as a result of the war between USA, Israel and Iran.
“We are looking at releasing, out of that K1b a sum of K100m. That will be released by Monday and that is going to go towards subsidizing fuel prices. After that we will continue to monitor the international price of oil,” Lelang said.
“The price subsidy of K1b is intended to absorb the price increase by 100 percent, meaning the public, you are not going to pay anything. We will absorb that and we will revert back to the March prices.
This means the current increase of K1.70 to the price of petrol, K3.24 added to the price of diesel and K3.35 added to the price of Kerosene will be removed.
“I just want to reassure everyone that we are doing everything around the clock to fix this and absorb that increase. We are handling and managing this. This is a big problem and the travelling public and our businesses have felt the pinch of this,” Lelang stated.
Daggy also added that, following the release of the K100m subsidy by Monday the prices of fuel will decrease.
“We are expecting to announce the change of prices by Tuesday and it should take effect at midnight and we will expect the adjusted prices by Wednesday,” Daggy said.
He also added that PNG does not have control over the global fuel prices and all they are doing is to make sure fuel distributors sell fuel according to the approved prices to the consumers.
The government also warns fuel distributors that after the release of the first batch of subsidy, all prices will have to return to the old prices. Any distributors selling beyond the approved prices will be dealt with accordingly.
