DAGUPAN CITY—House Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr said he is fully supporting the action taken by President Gloria Arroyo and the Cabinet to reduce the tariff on imported oil.

De Venecia told local newsmen here that the rising cost of fuel is a global calamity.

He said he also hopes the Senate will now pass the Ethanol Law approved by the House of Representatives principally authored by Congressman Miguel Zubiri which the Lower House had passed several months ago but still pending in the Senate.

De Venecia who was in Romania last week said he discussed with the foreign president the possibility of large- scale importation by the Philippines of passenger trucks to be used in the metropolitan areas that are fueled by compressed natural gas.

He said this is advantageous for two reasons: one, it’s much cheaper and secondly, it’s much cleaner and there will be no pollution.

“I hope we can have as many as 5,000 buses all over the Philippines,” he said.

He said he has also invited the president of Romania to drill for oil and gas in the Philippines. As a result, the Romanian president directed his foreign ministry to draw up a framework agreement with the Philippines on the various proposals de Venecia made to him including the drilling for oil and gas.

De Venecia noted that almost a hundred years ago, Romania was ahead of the Arabs and has successful oil drilling among the European powers.

At the same time, de Venecia stressed the need to expand the country’s commercial ties with the Russian Far East which has major oil production in Sakhalin and nearer than the Middle East by tanker.

If this pushes through, he said tankers can go straight from Manila Bay to Sakhalin which is just off Japan and off Korea.