Published
February 3, 2018, 10:00 PM By
Myrna M. Velasco
The Department of
Energy (DOE) has found ‘no violation’ on the sale of old inventories of the oil
companies, as well as those on their mandated submission of data and reports to
the government.
Nevertheless, the
department emphasized that because of the mandate to exclude old stocks from
those with excise tax imposition under the Tax Reform for Acceleration and
Inclusion (TRAIN) Act, Filipino consumers were also able to save more than P2.7
billion on costs at fuel pumps.
According to DOE
Assistant Secretary Leonido J. Pulido III, even for the oil companies that were
served with ‘show cause orders,” it was later established that they have fully
complied with the DOE’s directives relating to the oil inventory submission and
enforcement of excise taxes under the TRAIN Law.
The energy official,
however, stressed that the “findings are not that conclusive yet, because we
continue to validate data and reports as well as monitor their inventories.” On
the savings estimate, the department qualified that P2.64 billion had been
attributed to the old stocks of liquid petroleum fuels; and R58.4 million for
liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) products.
It similarly noted that
the savings were realized because the TRAIN Law in the industry had been
“fairly and responsibly implemented by all the participants.”
The department further
claimed that “long before the onset of the TRAIN Law’s implementation, the DOE
through its Oil Industry Management Bureau, acted to safeguard consumers’
welfare.”
It cited the series of
meetings it had with stakeholders, the incessant advisories to consuming public
and the spot checks undertaken at gasoline stations.
That had been on top of
steps relating to “data gathering and reviewing the inventory, examining the
paper trail as well as issuing show-cause orders to retail outlets that raised
prices before January 15,” which had been the department’s forecasted
exhaustion of the average oil inventory of industry players.
Amid the controversies
prior to the completion of the energy department’s completion of data and
inventory validation, Cusi defended that “we implemented a lot of initiatives
for the smooth implementation of the TRAIN Law, because we did not want
consumers to be compromised.”
Among the DOE
directives to the oil companies had been: To submit duly notarized inventory
report as of December 31, 2017 – on per depot and per product basis for
effective monitoring; and impose the excise taxes under TRAIN only after the
December 31 stocks of finished products are fully exhausted.
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