The Federal Government is open to the idea of having a weekly float system for fuel prices as opposed to the current monthly system, Deputy Finance Minister II Johari Abdul Ghani said yesterday.
Johari said this in response to a suggestion by the Petrol Dealers Association of Malaysia (PDAM) to the Finance Ministry last week that the pump price for fuel be revised weekly.
“Once the suggestion is implemented, we are not far away behind developed countries,” the New Straits Times Online‘s Khairul Iskandar Tajuddin quotes Johari as saying, with the caveat that a revised float system not impose a burden on the rakyat.
“There are several factors to be studied in this case.”
PDAM is expected to submit their formal proposal on the issue by next week.
In a related development, Johari said that Putrajaya would not revise Budget 2016 in the face of plummeting global oil prices.
“When we prepared the budget, the oil price was USD48 per barrel, but now it has dropped to USD36 per barrel.
“The impact on government revenue is bearable, so we do not see a need to do a revision at the moment.”
He added that even if the global price of crude oil were to drop below USD30 per barrel, the Federal Government would “tweak” its expenditure to accommodate changes in its coffers, rather than revise the national budget altogether.
