City administration queried over fuel tax

JAKARTA (JP): A councilor demanded on Tuesday the city administration quickly give a clear explanation why it has been unable to reach the target of Rp 36 billion (US$5.37 million) from fuel tax collections in the 1998/1999 fiscal year.

Councilor Amarullah Asbah, who heads the council's commission C for financial affairs, questioned the figure given by administration, Rp 14 billion, as the amount of fuel tax collected by city tax office personnel during the period.

"It's too far from the target. I think the city should earn more," Amarullah from the Golkar Party said.

He said according to his calculations the city could collect more than Rp 500 billion from the tax on fuel sales in the capital, based on an assumption that the average consumption of gasoline per day by the city's 2.8 million motor vehicles was 10 liters.

Based on Law no. 18/1997 on regional incomes and levies, the city is allowed to collect a five percent tax on all the gasoline sold here by the state-owned oil and gas company Pertamina.

Amarullah wondered why the amount of tax paid to the city by Pertamina remained low from year to year compared with the growing number of vehicles.

He said in the 1997/1998 fiscal year Pertamina paid only Rp 5 billion in fuel tax to the city administration.

Amarullah quoted city administration officials as saying that Pertamina officials had explained to them that the amount was based on a rough estimation since detailed guidelines for calculating Jakarta gasoline sales did not yet exist.

Pertamina used the same reason when explaining why the fuel tax paid to the city administration for the 1998/1999 fiscal year was Rp 14 billion, he added.

"How could gasoline sales not be counted for more than one year," he said.

He said the city administration currently needs extra money, obtainable from sources such as fuel tax, to payback a loan of Rp 64 billion it secured from the Ministry of Finance in 1997 to repair several city-owned markets burned in the same year.

"The administration should ask Pertamina to disclose the (amount of) gasoline sales in the city transparently," Amarullah added. (jun)