Digest on Malaysian News

The ex-prime minister of Malaysia and the adviser to Petronas, Dr. Mahathir Mohamad's respond and view on the recent oil price increase is drafted in such a manner that is quite easy to comprehend. Much easier to understand than the government signals on the imminent withdrawal of the fuel subsidies.

Some of his interesting paragraph extracted from his post are listed below:

1. The Government has now announced an increase in petrol price by 78 sen to RM2.70 per litre, an increase of more than 40 per cent.

2. Roughly Malaysia produces 650,000 barrels of crude per day. We consume 400,000 barrels leaving 250,000 barrels to be exported.

Three years ago the selling price of crude was about USD30 per barrel. Today it is USD130 – an increase of USD100. There is hardly any increase in the production cost so that the extra USD100 can be considered as pure profit.

Our 250,000 barrels of export should earn us 250,000 x 100 x 365 x 3 = RM27,375,000,000 (twenty seven billion Ringgit).

But Petronas made a profit of well over RM70 billion, all of which belong to the Government.

By all accounts the Government is flushed with money.

3. But besides petrol the prices of palm oil, rubber and tin have also increased by about 400 per cent. Plantation companies and banks now earn as much as RM3 billion in profits each. Taxes paid by them must have also increased greatly.

4. Malaysia is short of manpower. The labour intensive industries are not benefiting Malaysians. Foreign workers are remitting huge sums of money home.






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