Slamming a government plan to raise gas prices to match with international price of Liquefied Petroleum Gas that will be imported, speakers suggested that the government should explore unexplored and abandoned gas fields to meet the home demand for this natural resource.
Speakers at a protest rally claimed on Sunday that the government move would only allow local LPG manufacturing companies, loyal to the ruling party, to bag hefty profit, making domestic and industrial gas users the ultimate sufferers.
They also said that the government campaign for intensive use of LPG, instead of domestic natural gas, would not bring good results to the home industries, and instead, serve the interest of some vested groups.
Recently, seven state-owned gas distribution companies have proposed Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission for 100 to 140 per cent price hike of gas for various users.
The chief coordinator of Ganasanghati Andolan, Zonayed Saki, said at a protest rally that the government was preparing a ground for LPG traders who will import the liquefied gas from 2018 at a much higher price.
Protesting the fresh move to increase tariff within a year– following a similar hike in last September– violating BERC policy, Ganasanghati Andolan organised the protest rally on the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh premises at Kawran Bazar in the city.
Terming the production sharing contracts with some multinational gas extractors as discriminatory, Zonayed Saki told the rally that the government policy was against the national interest and was intended to create an artificial crisis of hydro-carbon in the country.
He said the government is encouraging multinational control on the domestic natural resources, instead of empowering the state-run BAPEX.
Zonayed Saki said importing costly LPG will be irrational, leaving many potential gas fields– onshore and offshore– unexplored, in the country.
Ganasanghati Andolan central coordinator Firoz Ahmed said, increase in tariff of any strategic commodities, such as gas, will certainly affect prices of other commodities and intensify people’s sufferings.
Taslima Akter, a leader of Garment Sramik Sanghati Andolan, said, currently many industrial units cannot operate due to lack of gas supply. A large portion of small enterprises still have no access to this essential energy source, she added.
Increasing tariff would not make them dependent on costly LPG, rather force them to collapse, Taslima argued.
The leaders vowed to resist the move of gas tariff hike at any cost.
Chaired by city coordinator Moniruddin Pappu, Ganasanghati Andolan central leaders, Abdus Salam, Jannatul Moriam Tania, Bacchu Bhuiyan, Bangladesh Student’s Federation president Saikat Mollik, also addressed the rally.
Source: New Age
