The price of a litre of fuel has crossed the GH¢ 7 mark for the first time at some pumps across the country.
Fuel prices per litre stayed at around Gh¢6.50 on average for a few weeks, and then rose to reach an average of Gh¢6.70 at most pumps in the past week alone, according to the Institute for Energy Security (IES).
The IES last week projected that on the back of the 7.42% increase in the price of Brent Crude, the 9.46% increase in the price of Gasoline, the 8.52% increase in Gasoil price and the 0.3% depreciation of the local currency against the US Dollar in the first 2 weeks of January, fuel prices in Ghana may hit GH¢7 soon.
Total, however, was selling a litre of petrol at GH¢6.99 and a litre of diesel at GH¢7.05.
A review of data from the Chamber of Petroleum Consumers (COPEC) shows that the second window of January had both fuels going for about GH¢5.08, representing a year-on-year increase of about 40% when the increases at Total are taken into consideration.
In an interview with Citi Business News, Executive Secretary of COPEC, Duncan Amoah said the increases would continue.
“You can now compare the situation to a football game without a goalkeeper. As many goals that could go in will go in. When world market prices go up, the average trotro driver has to pay for it here. When the Cedi depreciates, we all pay for it here. Again, when Finance Ministers decide to slap taxes, it is the trotro drivers and the ordinary Ghanaian will have to pay for it as far as fuel prices are concerned. Nothing has been done and nothing is being done.”
“Finance Ministers have turned a deaf ear to what drivers and some of us have been saying all this while, Bank of Ghana also continues to auction Dollars, when the fuel importers would have a very good need for these Dollars in order to pay their suppliers. Unfortunately, nothing has changed, we are back to a new year and the increases will simply continue,” he added.
Source: citibusinessnews.com