Prime Minister Edi Rama announced new measures for the fuel market, focusing on controlling abuses and increasing transparency.

In his podcast “Flasim”, he said that due to the global increase in oil prices, the government has decided to temporarily reduce the excise tax by around 20%, easing the burden on vehicle users. According to Rama, any additional revenue generated from the price increase will go toward protecting pensioners.

“I left this note for the end, not because of its importance, but on the contrary, because it coincides with an extremely complex global moment that has directly impacted the entire fuel supply chain and is being aggressively reflected in the rise of oil prices.

We have discussed this in recent days. It is an issue that requires attention and has our continuous attention, hour by hour, and as we have said, we have taken concrete steps. A task force has been established in the Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Finance in order to increase control and identify any possible abuse in the market. No abuses have been observed; monitoring continues, and since the price has seen another increase, the decision has been made to enter the transparency board regime, which will ensure that there will be no beneficiaries or profiteers, as they say on the other side of the mountains, who will seek to exploit the crisis to put more money in their pockets.

At the same time, another decision has been made to intervene with a temporary measure, as other countries are doing, by reducing the fuel excise by about 20%, in order to somewhat ease the burden on vehicle users. However, I want to make it very, very clear that at the end of the day, our primary concern is to protect pensioners, which means that in this case, the increased level of revenue that will enter the state treasury from the price increase, whatever it may be, after the reduction of the excise, will go solely to protect and support pensioners,” Rama said.