The government’s willingness to once again suspend excise taxes on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and kerosene offers immediate relief to millions of struggling households-and reveals just how precarious their economic security truly is. (Read the BusinessMirror story: PHL mulls over halting tax on cooking gas, kerosene, July 25, 2026).
Finance Secretary Frederick D. Go’s announcement that another tax suspension is ‘possible’ if Dubai crude remains above $80 per barrel for 30 days is the right short-term response to an untenable situation. With kerosene prices already jumping by nearly P12 per liter last week alone, and further increases of P3 to P7 per liter expected across all fuel types, poor families can no longer afford to tighten their belts. For millions of households that rely on LPG and kerosene for basic daily needs, the P2.5 billion in foregone government revenue is a small price to pay for keeping the lights on and stoves burning.
But let us be clear about what this represents: triage, not treatment.
The country finds itself at the mercy of geopolitical forces it cannot control. The escalating conflict in the Middle East-now expanding from the Strait of Hormuz to the Red Sea with Houthi attacks on commercial shipping-has injected a volatile risk premium into global oil markets. When President Donald Trump threatens ‘major military punishment’ and contemplates ‘massive attacks’ on Iran, Filipino families thousands of miles away brace for higher jeepney fares, and more expensive goods, including LPG and kerosene.
This is not sustainable energy policy. It is crisis management masquerading as governance.
Executive Order No. 114, which provides the mechanism for these tax suspensions, was designed precisely because policymakers recognized this vulnerability. But the fact that we are already contemplating a second suspension within months-after the first three-month reprieve ended on July 8-should alarm us. The ‘when’ of these suspensions has become not a matter of if, but how often.
The fundamental problem remains unchanged: the Philippines remains heavily dependent on imported fossil fuels, with domestic prices tethered to the violent fluctuations of global markets and the petrodollar machinations of distant powers. Every Middle East flare-up becomes a tax on Filipino kitchens. Every Strait of Hormuz skirmish translates to higher prices at the sari-sari store.
What is needed is not merely a suspension of taxes when prices spike, but a serious reckoning with energy security. Renewable energy investments, strategic petroleum reserves, mass transit infrastructure that reduces fuel dependence, and targeted subsidies that reach the truly needy without bankrupting the treasury-these are the conversations that should dominate policy discussions, not just emergency meetings when Dubai crude breaches arbitrary thresholds.
For now, the DBCC should absolutely recommend suspension. The alternative-allowing poor households to absorb the full brunt of an P87 per barrel oil price while regional tensions escalate-is unconscionable. But when the immediate crisis passes and prices inevitably retreat, as they always do, the government must resist the temptation to declare mission accomplished.
The next suspension, whenever it comes, should be the last. Not because oil prices will never rise again-they will-but because by then, we should have built something more resilient than a tax code that changes with the headlines from the Persian Gulf.
Filipino families deserve energy security, not energy charity.