Faizel Patel – 17/03/2021
The Automobile Association (AA) says the forecasted increase in the petrol prices in April is deeply concerning and is expected to hurt many people.
The AA’s Layton Beard was speaking to Radio Islam about the massive hike in fuel prices next month.
Beard says mid-month data from the Central Energy Fund (CEF) points to another big hike in fuel prices, on the heel of sizeable increases in the first three months of 2021.
Beard says the fuel price is expected to increase by at least about R1, 16 per litre, which includes the fuel levy of 26 cents announced by finance minister Tito Mboweni in his budget speech.
“These increases are coming at a very bad time for South African consumers, we’re extremely worried about the levy increases. We think that there is a lot of pressure at the moment on consumer and the fuel prices isn’t helping. We need to understand it’s not only motorists that suffer when the fuel price goes up, it’s everybody because fuel impacts on all industries and there is a direct and indirect knock-on effect on every single person in this country.”
Beard says the impact of international petroleum prices may not be as pronounced as they are in South Africa because of the Rand, which is struggling.
“There are some countries that are battling but by and large a lot of countries are in the same boat as South Africa where we see these fluctuations. Unfortunately the fluctuations we’ve seen over the last couple of months have all been upward and that really is the trend for now, we are very worried about this.”
Beard has advised consumers and motorist to keep an eye on their budget to see if they can cut back on their fuel expenditure as there may be possible increases in the future depending on the daily data during a specific month.
Listen to the interview with Layton Beard
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