“An extremely important bill has just been passed, namely declaring a state of crisis in the fuel sector, reducing the excise tax on diesel, limiting diesel exports, capping the commercial margin, and imposing a special surtax on exceptional profits in the fuel sector. This should lead to a reduction in the final price for private consumers as well as for companies in our country,” Ivan stated.
He noted that the bill was introduced by the PSD a week ago, was adopted by the Senate on Monday, and received Parliament’s approval on Wednesday, with the support of several parliamentary groups. Ivan compared the current situation to the period when he served as Minister of Energy. He argues that although the international price of oil has fallen, the price of diesel at the pump has risen.
“On April 23, the price of a barrel of oil was $105, and diesel cost 9 lei per liter. Today, the price is $78 per barrel and 10 lei per liter of diesel,” said the former minister. He recalled that, during his tenure, the government adopted an emergency ordinance declaring a state of crisis in the fuel market, a measure that expired at the end of June.
At the same time, Ivan criticized the interim government. The former minister says that the lack of intervention after the measures expired led to higher costs for drivers. “People paid more—about one leu per liter—because the ousted government failed to do its job.
Today (Editor’s note: Wednesday), in Parliament, we corrected this and managed to intervene in the market once again to reduce the final price of fuel for the public and for Romanian companies,” Ivan stated.