The New Patriotic Party Parliamentary candidate for Obuasi has described as a “big lie” threats by the National Petroleum Authority (NPA) that prices of petroleum products would shoot up if a recent court ruling against the NPA was allowed to stand. Kwaku Kwarteng had challenged the legality of the ex-refinery differential levy imposed by the NPA and got the courts to rule in his favour. The court described the levy as illegal, more so when it had no Parliamentary approval and ordered the NPA to pay back the accumulated receipts into the consolidated fund. But the NPA beliefs the judge erred in the ruling and had applied for a stay of execution whilst it prepares to appeal the case. The NPA boss, Alex Mould on Tuesday told Joy FM the ex-refinery differential is not a tax but a stabilizing margin used to subsidise the prices of LPG, kerosene, premix fuel and other products. According to him, the differential was not a creation of the NDC but was actually introduced in 2006 by the NPA board under the erstwhile NPP regime. “Just to explain how the price build up is set; the price build up is set based on prices at a certain time so the pump price was based on a crude oil price of about $92 [per barrel] which was the average of the latter part of December 2010 price. Prices have now moved from $92 to approximately an average of $110. That means that the consumer is paying at the pump $92 but we have to pay the supplier $110. Now the ex-refinery differential takes care of that,” he explained to host of Joy FM Super Morning Show on Tuesday. He said the court ruling, if allowed to stand, would lead to an astronomical increase in prices of petroleum products with premix fuel for example shooting up by over 100 percent while Liquefied Petroleum Gas will rise by 57 percent. But the plaintiff in the matter has debunked the assertions by Mr Mould. Kwaku Kwarteng could not understand how the removal of an illegal tax on the petroleum price build-up would rather lead to the increase in prices of products. He argued the removal should rather lead to the reduction in prices of the products- some to the tune of ¢1.00. He said the NPA cannot arrogate to itself powers of Parliament and impose taxes on Ghanaians with reckless abandon and operate accounts whose signatories nobody knew. On whether the illegal tax had been in operation before the NDC came into power, Kwaku Kwarteng said he is unaware of the presence of such a tax and challenged the NPA to provide documentary evidence to substantiate their claims. He stated however that irrespective of the year the tax was introduced a court of competent jurisdiction has declared it as illegal and urged the NPA to abide by the court ruling and stop peddling lies.