Consumers Association of Malawi (CAMA) has cautioned politicians against politicizing issues of fuel prices ahead of the May 21, 2019 Tripartite Elections.
CAMA’s executive director John kapito observed that during electoral campaign, politicians make false promises concerning how they will reduce the prices of fuel once voted into power.
On the other hand Kapito faulted government for the tendency of attributing any decline in fuel prices to itself in order to gain political mileage.
Kapito said issues of fuel prices are not handled by politicians or government rather the petroleum industry itself using the trends that dictates the global oil market.
“As we are approaching elections, fuel prices at the international level do not know that Malawi is having an election, therefore anything can happen at any time so politics must be taken away from how fuel prices are done.”
He added that if it happens that fuel prices goes up or down along the way, government must always respond to any changes on the international market without any fear of losing an election.
“All the mechanics in the price build-up must be respected. I must highlight here that it is not government that buys fuel rather it is the industry that buys and puts the product on the market and the buyer which happens to be the industry itself must be able to get back its money, therefore no politics should apply.”
