INQUIRER.net
LEGAZPI CITY—A militant group of jeepney drivers yesterday announced a Bicol-wide strike tomorrow to press the top three oil companies to immediately bring down prices of diesel and gasoline by P8 per liter.
Joel Ascutia, regional chair of the Concerned Drivers and Operators for Reform (Condor)-Piston, yesterday said Shell, Chevron and Petron should implement a one-time-big-time rollback since oil prices in the world market had dropped more than three times already.
From the highest $147 a barrel, crude oil price has already gone down to a record low of $45.
The group expects more than 10,000 drivers of jeepneys and tricycles to join the strike from 1 a.m. till midnight and paralyze 95 percent of vehicular traffic.
Ascutia said the riding public should also benefit from the great plunge of world oil prices.
George San Mateo, secretary general of Condor-Piston, said that with the P8 overprice, the three oil companies were earning almost P48 million daily in profits from jeepney drivers and P29 million from tricycle drivers.
The estimates were derived by multiplying P8 with 30 liters, the normal consumption of one jeepney a day, and with 200,000, the total number of public utility jeepneys nationwide.
The same formula was used for tricycles, which normally consume five liters daily. There are at least 650,000 tricycles in the country.
Mateo said that although oil prices were legally deregulated, President Macapagal-Arroyo should exercise an oversight function through government agencies and task forces. “(Her) tolerance of the overpricing of giant oil firms is considered a betrayal of public trust, which is an impeachable offense,” he added.
Tessa Lopez, regional spokesperson of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan, said the Big 3’s excess profits would reach at least P320 million daily, covering both public and private transportation.
Ascutia said Condor-Piston was calling for the lifting of the 12 percent value-added tax on oil, the scrapping of the oil deregulation law, the nationalization of oil exploration and production, and the abolition of the cartel system in the industry.
The group’s leaders also urged laborers and employees not to go to work, students and teachers not to attend classes, and poor families to hold a noise barrage during the strike.
In Manila, the Land Transportation and Franchising Regulatory Board will hold a public hearing on a fare rollback on Dec. 3. Last month, it granted a 50-centavo probationary rollback but consumers are asking for P1 more with the further decreases in world oil prices. Ephraim Aguilar, Inquirer Southern Luzon
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