Petrol Price

I was wondering, the government said that the current price of petrol in Malaysia at RM2.70 is after a discount of 30 sen, and that pricing was set when the global crude oil was trading at USD136 per barrel, now that the crude oil price is down to USD125 per barrel;

• Are we getting a discount or are we paying a premium for our petrol?
• Will the government reduce the petrol and diesel prices if the global crude oil goes lower?
• Why do we need to pay our petrol based on global commodity trading price?

Petronas is own by the government and the oil should be directly own by the government.

In a recent forum among corporate leaders organised by Bloomberg, Datuk Idris Jala (MAS) - based on his previous experience in multinational Petroleum company, told the attendees that the actual cost for producing oil is only around USD30-USD40 per barrel, the rest are trade margin. If this is the situation why do we need to trade or pricing based on global petrol trading price, since the petrol were sold domestically. In my opinion only the portion for export should be based on commodity trading price.

The purpose of commodity trading is to replace barter trade. Barter trade and commodity trading involves international trade, whereas for domestic consumption should be exempted from following the international trading price. Please correct me on this if I am wrong.

Or is it just to give Petronas huge profit from the pricing, then gives some dividend back to the government from the profit, but at the same time we as Malaysian citizen was unwittingly taxed when we buy petrol and contribute to the profit of Petronas and paying dividend to the government.