Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry (ICCI) has called upon the government & the oil refineries to provide due relief to people by reducing prices of POL products as people were almost buried under the skyrocketing prices of utilities, POL and food items. It said the government has already allowed 18 percent increase in gas and 12 percent increase in power tariffs from January 1, 2010 and feared these increases will have negative impact on law and order situation in the country.

Zahid Maqbool, President ICCI, presiding over a meeting in the Chamber, said that government was earning huge revenue from people in the form of taxes on the prices of POL products, which was a great injustice to inflation-stricken people. He said government should reduce prices of petroleum products to provide a sigh of relief to the general public. 

He said the recent increase in the prices of utilities & POL products will immensely hit the industrial & agricultural productivity thus putting highly negative impact on overall economy. He lamented that government has continuously been increasing the prices of POL in complete disregard of the hardship and problems being faced by the common man as well as by the different sectors of the economy, especially industry & agriculture.

He said whenever the POL prices were reduced in the international market, the same were kept high in Pakistan and whenever the prices go up in the international market, government immediately shifts the whole burden to the people, which is highly discriminatory.

Zahid Maqbool feared that prices of all the goods produced locally will go up sharply in near future further squeezing the purchasing power of general public. He said a large number of small and medium sized business units were closed in the last six months owing to surging cost of production while this increase will ultimately cause closure of more industrial units unleashing new wave of massive unemployment.

He said frequent increase in gas, power tariffs, transport fares and oil prices will accelerate the capital flight and will discourage local & foreign direct investment. He said other countries in the region including India were providing relief to their consumers by reducing POL prices and questioned the logic of Government of Pakistan for making peoples lives more miserable by increasing prices of these products.

ICCI President said government must take business community into confidence before taking important decisions and demanded immediate withdrawal of increase in POL prices.