Ghana's Energy Sector, Oil and Gas News
New Year problems
Education makes a people easy to lead but difficult to drive, easy to govern but impossible to enslave. Henry Peter Brougham
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When the government introduced Value Added Tax on petroleum products in September last year, some of us were ignored when we said it was bound to have ripple effects on the economy because as our elders have so eloquently espoused, if you cut your tongue and chew it, you have not eaten any meat. This is so because after that act, you will lose your sense of taste and it would have been more worthwhile if you had not eaten your tongue.
Even with the drastic fall in global crude oil prices, we are feeling the bite from the excessive taxes imposed on oil. It does not make sense to tax consumers of fuel for transportation or other purposes to subsidise electricity generation when consumers of electricity are better positioned to do that. So does it fly in the face of logic to tax petroleum products to raise funds towards oil exploration when we ha
Like pregnancy that can never be hidden from the public, when the law was passed, the government might have assumed that Ghanaians would never find out about the tax element, but now the cat is out of the bag. Coming in the wake of increases in the tariffs for electricity and water, it has become unbearable for the average Ghanaian to keep quiet over the developments which confront us as we begin a new year, especially a year in which we are faced with a crucial general election.
The average Ghanaian does not consider demonstration as a legitimate means of pursuing a fundamental right. That is why when some people decide to engage in a demonstration, they are immediately seen as saboteurs or nation wreckers. We need to come out of this cocoon of an attitude and be more assertive in telling our governments when we have had enough and are not prepared for any further hardships.
As has been noted by that great Indian Patriarch, Mahatma Gandhi, “There is wisdom in taking serious steps with great caution and hesitation. But caution and hesitation have their limits, and we have now passed them. The government has taken leave of all sense of decency. We would only be betraying our unworthiness and cowardice if we cannot stake our all in the face of the conflagration which envelopes us and sit with folded hands.”
The same sentiments are echoed by Dr Martin Luther King who submits that “But there comes a time when people get tired. There comes a time when people get tired of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression. There comes a time when people get tired of being plunged across the abyss of exploitation where they experience the bleakness of nagging despair. There comes a time when people get tired of being pushed out of the glittering sunlight of life’s July and left standing in the piercing chill of Alpine November.”
We were told time and again that our government can no longer subsidise the price of petroleum products. That is why even in the absence of law the National Petroleum Authority announced the deregulation of the pricing of petroleum products. At least, for the few months that the policy has prevailed, we benefited from the downward trend in the fall of oil prices as crude tumbled on the global market. That equally brought us another gain since we are a net importer of crude oil. What this means is that while we have lost heavily from our crude oil exports, we have gained enormously from our oil imports.
But why must a government which is justifiably not prepared to subsidise oil prices suddenly impose taxes on consumers because oil prices have become low and thus a cheap source of raising revenue to make up for shortfalls from taxes that could have been generated from higher productivity? In the end, the government is indirectly making the cost of local production expensive even as we preach about patronising made-in-Ghana goods. We render local products uncompetitive and then turn round to condemn our people for developing tastes for imported goods.
The time has come for us to tell our government in the face that enough is enough. There is a limit to everything. If we increase government revenue and render individuals vulnerable, it will amount to robbing Peter to pay Paul. We must pursue policies that will bring about real growth. The time has come for us to throw caution away. After all, as Jesus Christ said, the law was made for man and not man for the law.
