Fuelling price spiral Monday, 24 January 2011 03:17

We had to change yesterday's page one lead story at the eleventh hour after receiving the ‘breaking news’ that Woqod was increasing its fuel prices from
January 23.

We were surprised that the time gap between the announcement and implementation of such an important decision was not even 24 hours and it was effected on a weekend!

Here we raise the question that begs an answer: Where are our consumer rights?

By implementing the fuel price increase in less than 24 hours, Woqod showed little respect for the basic rights of the consumer.

If you take the legal perspective, any business agreement or contract has a grace period of at least 1 month before the implementation of any new decision as standard practice. Each party is expected to inform or give notice to the other party when it wants to change or terminate a particular contract before implementing the actual change or termination.

Some people may think that the price increase is negligible. But an increase in the price of fuel usually has a chain effect on the price of other commodities in the market. Since there was an increase of around 25 percent to 100 percent in the price of fuel, this will surely affect the price of transportation, which in turn will increase the price of basic goods and thus increase the price of services.

We are all affected by this. We are not concerned with the quantum of increase. What we are concerned about though is the way such an increase was implemented without giving enough notice to the public.

In democratic societies, any major decision, or implementation of any major decision, will have to go through a process and will have to be approved by a group of people that represents the interests of the majority.

During the Prime Minister’s meeting with the Qatar Chamber of Commerce and the Qatar Businessmen’s Association last year, he had warned private businessmen against creating monopolies and jacking up prices.

Woqod is a semi-government company. If Woqod does not follow what the Prime Minister of the country said last year, what does that imply? Does it mean that there are different standards for government-run and privately owned businesses?

We hope to hear the voices of the Advisory Council, the Central Municipal Council and the Qatar Chamber of Commerce addressing the issue. We hope that they will discuss the issue and provide possible solutions. When many countries in the Arab world are up in arms over the increase in prices, Woqod’s decision to increase fuel prices will not reflect positively on Qatar. This will not be a good reflection on how decisions are taken in Qatar, either. The Peninsula