Gasoline price hike: MPs demand compensation

Manama : MPs in the House of Representatives are seeking to compensate citizens for the sudden gasoline price hike that was implemented last week by the Government.

Several committees in the House held their regular weekly meetings yesterday and postponed their work agenda to discuss the price increase enforced from last Monday.

The majority of members of the council’s Legislative and Legal Committee, Public Utilities and Environment Committee and Services Committee suggested a clear mechanism to compensate citizens should be put in place at the earliest. However, they didn’t specify the compensation amounts.

Their weekly work agendas were postponed  and the gasoline price hike was exceptionally discussed, as per the instructions of the Speaker of the House of Representatives Ahmed bin Ibrahim Al Mulla, as part of the preparations for a government-parliamentary meeting that is scheduled to be held today to discuss the redirection of subsidies to only benefit citizens. The meeting follows the directives of His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa.

Legislative and Legal Affairs Committee Head MP Majid Al Majid, Public Utilities and Services Committee Head MP Mohsen Al Bakri and Services Committee Head MP Abbas Al Madhi all confirmed following their meetings that a suggestion to immediately stop the decision to hike gasoline prices was also discussed among committees’ members.

As reported on DT News last Tuesday, the price of gasoline was suddenly increased at all fuel stations in the Kingdom.

The price Jayyid fuel (91-octane) was increased to 140fils/litre after it was sold for 125fils/litre since the last price hike in January, 2016. Mumtaz fuel (95-octane) price was also increased from 160fils/litre to 200fils/litre.

This irked the MPs as they weren’t consulted by the concerned authority before the prices were increased. They even threatened to suspend all of their weekly meetings until the decision is withdrawn and the old prices are implemented once again.

It’s worth mentioning that the latest edition of the Official Gazette was published on Thursday and mentioned that the price increase came as per Resolution 1 of 2018 of Oil Minister Shaikh Mohammed bin Khalifa bin Ahmed Al Khalifa and that it comes into effect beginning January 8, 2018.  

In another development and similar to the MPs recommendation, MP Isa Al Kooheji submitted an urgent proposal to increase the anti-inflation allowances granted by the government to citizens by BD100. The proposal stipulates that married Bahrainis earning BD300 or less a month should be granted BD200 instead of the existing BD100, while the two other categories earning BD301-BD700 and BD701-BD1,000 should be granted BD175 and BD150, respectively.