The petrol price increase

So, our "beloved" BN government has decided to increase the price of petrol by 78sen/liter effective 12.00am Thursday. While I do agree that this will eventually happen as it is really necessary to go to market rates for this commodity, I am irked by the way it is actually implemented. And I do agree with the views of this reader.

Why did the government have to announce such a heavy increase in a matter of hours? This action will encourage kiasu drivers and petrol hoarders to fill up their vehicles/containers with petrol. It will also cause petrol stations to run out of the resource and cause multiple traffic congestions everywhere because of the long lines to fill up the tanks.

Why not implement it like this? Announce that at the end of 39 days, the price of petrol would have been increased by 78sen/liter. Then implement a 2sen/liter increase per day so that there is not such a big shock of increase and also this will discourage too many kiasu people to fill up at the same time (after all, you can only save 2sen/liter compared to the next day). It will also discourage hoarders, because the petrol kept for too long becomes stale.