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The liquefied Petroleum Gas Marketers Association (LPGMA) has hinted they would stop operations nationwide should the Ministry of Energy fail to use constitutional means possible to address their concerns.

The National Petroleum Authority (NPA) has introduced a new policy document that would regulate the use and safety of LPG in the country to avert disasters that are associated with the use of the petroleum product.

The association members said they will not accept any draft submitted to them by the ministry because they had no idea who drafted it since they were not consulted.

Mr. Gabriel Kumi, vice chairman of LPGMA, told the Daily Heritage that the association felt the decision of the ministry was wrong because as major players, “we think as various associations in the industry we should have been invited to give our quota from the beginning of the process.

“When we look at the policy, our roles have been taken away from us by a new set of people, who decided that we were not going to be part of it. Another meeting was called sometime in October that they wanted to pass the policy so we should bring our input. We resisted the attempt to pass the policy because the policy was inimical to us and our job.”

He added that the association thought the old policy was for the previous government but realized that the same policy has been rehashed and given harder push.

Fear grips members

Mr. Kumi said their businesses were collapsing because financial institutions were to ready to give them financial support because they fear that their money would be locked up judging from the comments by the Chief Executive Officer of National Petroleum Authority, Mr. Hassan Tampuli that, the various LPG stations would some stop operating.

He said “according to the financial institutions, they fear our businesses will fold up and therefore there is no need to risk their investment. We understand where the banks are coming from; you cannot give financial support to an institution which is going to collapse.”

According to the Vice Chairman, the ministry wrote to the association that they had suspended the policy but unfortunately, the government used the Atomic Junction gas explosion incident to launch the cylinder regulation, refusing their request.

Mr. Kumi added that the ministry asked them to meet a committee that would address their concern but when they met with them the committee said they could not address their concern.

“We were not featured anywhere so we immediately wrote to the minister requesting for an urgent meeting to discuss this particular issue with him because we felt that if they are bringing any policy to an existing industry it is fair that the players in the industry are automatically transferred under the policy and absorbed by the policy and not rendered useless but this was not done,” he said.