The Ghana Private Road Transport Union(GPRTU) has said it would soon announce new transport fares due to rapidly increasing fuel prices in the country.
Currently, the price of petrol per litre has crossed GH¢11, and diesel sells for over GH¢14 per litre at most pumps.
The leadership of GPRTU said these prices were taking a heavy toll on their members nationwide.
According to the Head of Communications at GPRTU, Abbas Moro, this is causing members to push for an increment in transportation fares as soon as possible to relieve them of their financial burdens.
“We have sensitized the general public that whenever the prices of fuel go up 10 percent above the existing price, automatically we are supposed to increase fares. There are so many things to look out for, including the current economic situation. So for where we are heading towards, we cannot keep sacrificing – definitely when our leadership meets, something positive must come out,” he told Citi News.
In May 2022, transportation fares went up by 20% when petrol and diesel were selling at a national average of GH¢9.41 and GH¢11.12, respectively.
Pump prices of fuel have shot up 288 per cent since January 2017 to date, according to data from the energy think-tank Institute of Energy Security (IES).
Currently, diesel is almost GH¢15 per litre while petrol sells for over GH¢11 per litre at the pumps. Some filling stations in July recorded some marginal price drops.
However, the Chief Executive Officer of NPA, Dr. Mustapha Abdul-Hamid, was optimistic that fuel prices would drop.
”We have enough fuel in the country to meet the demands. There should be no concern regarding the supply of diesel, especially.”
After a rampant increase in the price of fuel at the pumps, consumers seemed pleased with the drop in prices at some fuel stations and were hopeful of further reductions in the following months.
This came as some Oil Marketing Companies across the country reduced their prices by up to 60 pesewas per litre.
In the first six and half months of 2021, for instance, pump prices went up 36 per cent from GH¢4.79 in January to GH¢6.70 in December and 110 percent from GH¢6.70 to GH¢14, respectively, with government sources blaming it on the Russian-Ukraine conflict.
At the beginning of this year, a litre of diesel which sold at GH¢6.70, now goes for GH¢14, with many fearing that the worst is yet to come, given the deteriorating economic situation in the country and happenings on the international stage.
While the war in Eastern Europe might have impacted prices across the world, with Ghana not an exception, most industry watchers hold the view that the depreciation of the cedi – which has lost over 30 per cent of its value this year – is a much bigger problem.