Apparently, there are serious differences between the petroleum companies and the fuel transport companies, and this conflict is generating at least part of the current scarcity being felt across the country. According to El Caribe, the fuel distributors Shell, Texaco, Isla and Esso and the Association of Petroleum Transporters have faced off with regards to a legislative proposal recently passed by the Senate and now headed to the Chamber of Deputies. Many of yesterday?s papers carried a paid announcement by the oil companies that rejected the new legislation. The proposed new law establishes penalties for violations in the area of fossil fuels and petroleum derivatives, and regulates the transportation of petroleum products. It consolidates two proposals sent to the Congress by the Executive Branch at the behest of the Ministry of Industry & Commerce. The ministry?s aim is to punish, fine and eliminate the licenses for those stations that commit serious faults with regard to the handling of fuels and their sale to the public. The other proposal, now included with the first one, is a proposal from the Petroleum Transporters? Association.
The main objection, according to consultant Gerardo Simon, is the way in which the two legislative projects have been combined, and Article 30 of the proposal that gives the transport companies the right to sue the distributors for any losses they incur, plus the value of their investment in the transport of fuel, and three times the average income of the transport agent over the previous year. The legislation states that these penalties may be assessed ?in the case of the firing, substitution or termination of the contract to transport fuels that has existed between the parties, or the negation to renew said contract, unilaterally and without justification, by the distributor.? The consultant told El Caribe that under these conditions it would be nearly impossible ?to get out of this marriage.? Rosanna Grullon, an official with Texaco, said that these provisos limit the freedom to make contracts with other transport companies and may even reward inefficient transport entities. The head of the transport association, Nelson Crespo, said that if his members were inefficient, then ?why was Opetrasa (one of the transporters) just awarded, for the second consecutive year, the second-place award for Worldwide Efficiency by Esso Standard Oil??
Meanwhile, the refinery was loading 90 propane tank trucks a day in an attempt to satisfy the national shortage of the product. Sources told reporters from Hoy that part of the scarcity stems from the fact that the private importers of propane, such as Coastal and Mundogas, are afraid to run the risk of bringing in the gas and then discovering that the government will not honor its obligation to pay the subsidy that is currently estimated at RD$35 per gallon of propane gas. Amaury Justo Duarte, the head of the refinery, told the reporters that another ship with propane was expected to unload tomorrow. He pointed out, however, that the refinery was only supplying 60% of the national demand for the gas, and it was the reduced supply reaching the private companies was causing the lack of the product at the consumer level.