Nay Pyi Taw is investigating the previous government’s sale of state-owned gas stations to the private sector after suspicions were flagged over allegedly low prices, according to a Mon State official.
Minister of Electricity, Energy and Industry U Min Htin Aung Han said the central government instructed state officials to form an investigative commission and submit a list of names of people to be questioned.
"The fuel station issue was submitted to Nay Pyi Taw after I raised a question about it during the previous hluttaw session,” U Min Htin Aung Han said.
“The State Counsellor is personally handling this issue,” he told the Mon State Hluttaw on December 11 in response to a question raised by MP U Zaw Zaw Htoo from Paung Constituency – 2 on whether the government plans to repair or confiscate the state-owned fuel stations that were sold off.
U Zaw Zaw Htoo said the sales were unacceptable as they were sold below the market price and the contracts were not legal. He claimed that the 17 previously state-owned gas stations in Mon State were sold off for between K8.4 million and K40 million each. The sales included not only the land, but also the buildings and fuel storage tanks, he added.
U Min Htin Aung Han said that 261 out of the 273 state-owned gas stations, including the ones previously owned by Myanmar Petroleum Products Enterprise, have been sold nationwide since mid-2010.
