House panel asks Duterte to call for special session on rising fuel prices
MANILA, Philippines — The House Committee on Energy on Tuesday asked President Rodrigo Duterte to call for a special session of Congress to pass a law suspending the collection of excise taxes on fuel.
Congress is on break until May 22 and will need to hold a special session to convene. Under the 1987 Constitution, the president can call for one at any time, as he did in March 2020 to ask for emergency powers to address the COVID-19 pandemic.
Rep. Carlos Zarate (Bayan Muna party-list) moved during a panel hearing on increasing fuel prices to ask for a special session to allow them to deliberate on the measure right away.
"The measure that will immediately help our people...is the suspension of fuel excise taxes. Here we are again considering to enact this into law but even if we pass [it] right now, it won't have much significance since this is not a regular session," Zarate said in Filipino.
"I am calling on this committee, including the one that met last week (the fuel crisis ad hoc committee) to push for a special session," he added.
Several groups, including members of the transport industry and the fisherfolk sector, have raised concerns on the sustained fuel price hikes driven by tight global supply.
Under the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion(TRAIN) law, the excise tax for gasoline stands at P10 per liter, P6 per liter for diesel, and P5 per liter for kerosene.
"This committee is asking the president to have special sessions. We have made [this] not individually but as a whole," Rep. Mikey Arroyo (Pampanga), panel chair, said during the hearing.
Domestic oil firms announced another round of price increases this week- the largest yet since the start of the year. Starting today, gasoline rose P7.1 per liter; diesel jumped P13.15 per liter and kerosene increased by P10.5 per liter.
In a statement last week, House Speaker Lord Allan Velasco (Marinduque) said that the House is willing to hold a special session to address the rising fuel price increases, should the president call for one.
Also last week, Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon said government can put the collection of excise taxes on hold even without changing the TRAIN Law.
"There is no stopping the executive, specifically the Department of Finance and the Bureau of Internal Revenue, from suspending the collection of excise taxes on petroleum products, if they really want to mitigate the impact of high oil prices on the cost of goods and living expenses of the ordinary Filipino," he said.
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