EDITORIAL - Time to bring oil firms to court

It is good that Cebu Governor Gwen Garcia has brought to the DOJ the matter of huge disparities in the prices of oil products between those sold in Cebu and those sold in Manila and in other parts of the country.

For the matter is no longer just about prices but about greed and abuse by the oil firms which. For no sooner had she issued the threat to sue than at least one of the big three oil firms, Pilipinas Shell, promptly raised pump prices in Cebu by a whooping P1.50 per liter.

The increase, made just a day or two after Governor Garcia issued her threat, could not have been determined by market forces, as how the Shell representative explained the increases at a meeting called by the governor, unless such market forces operate on uncanny coincidence.

The other big players did not immediately follow the Shell increase, thereby proving that it was not market forces that came into play here but pure manipulation. An increase that huge on the heels of the threat by the governor to sue is due from nothing else but spite.

Spite is not beyond the capabilities of these companies to dispense. In fact, precisely why we have this issue of Cebu being slapped so much higher prices than Manila and elsewhere is because of spite. The big three oil companies are squeezing Cebu out of spite.

For what, we do not know. And that is why the charges by the governor should at least allow the courts to clear up the air and hopefully put a stop to the continued greed and abuse practiced by these companies.

Filing charges against these companies will be in the best interest of everyone. At least everybody can have their day in court, and a very volatile subject matter can be weighed and resolved in a judicious matter.

Resolving the matter this way is much better than having other forces, like communist rebels, ride on the issue by patently more violent means. On the other hand, the rebels have been disconcertingly quiet on the issue. Have “revolutionary taxes” changed hands?