Reversal of Customs Act to Pata ruled out

One-time amnesty for NCP vehicles suggested

PESHAWAR: Ruling out reversal of the extension of the Customs Act to Malakand and other Provincially-Administered Tribal Areas (PATA), the Customs authorities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have said they have already started arrangements for the implementation of the law.

The Collector Model Customs Collectorate (MCC), Qurban Ali Khan, while clarifying the recent decision of the government regarding the implementation of the Customs Act 1969, said the law had already been extended by the President of Pakistan to PATA in 1975.

Elaborating, he said the President as authorised by Article 246 of the Constitution through Regulation No 3 extended the Customs Act 1969 on July 22, 1975 to PATA and only its implementation was pending for which the recent notification was issued.

However, he added that the wording of the March 28 notification might be misleading, but the real issue was not the extension of the act. “Rather it is the implementation of the law in these areas that was sought from the President of Pakistan,” he clarified.

“There arises no question of any reversal at all. It is the regulation ordered by the President, which cannot be reversed,” he said when asked about the possibility of backtracking on the extension of the law.

The Collector said the Customs stations were already working at Shahi and Bin Shahi in Upper Dir and Mirkhani in Chitral to facilitate trade on the Pak-Afghan border.  He added that Customs Facilitation Centre headed by a deputy collector was recently established in Batkhela in Malakand district in Provincially-Administered Tribal Areas.

He said the Customs Act 1969 on its passage was extended to the whole of the country, while the President in exercise of his powers through Regulation No 1 vide notification No.F.5(1)-F.III/82-VoL-III dated 7-1-1984 also extended the act to the whole of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).

Qurban Ali informed that customs facilitation centres were already working at Jamrud and Torkham in Khyber Agency and Parachinar, Kharlachi, Burki, Teri Mangal and Shaheedano Dhand in Kurram Agency, Ghulam Khan in North Waziristan and Khapakh in Mohmand Agency.

“To facilitate the traders and industrial units in Malakand division in Provincially-Administered Tribal Areas, the customs facilitation centre in Batkhela was set up where five ghee, cooking oil mills and packages firms in the area were contributing over Rs1 billion in custom duty to the exchequer,” Qurban Ali pointed out.

He said the cosmetic industry in Swat is also facing problems in clearing its raw material and items in Karachi and elsewhere and this would also be facilitated at their doorsteps. He said the implementation of the Customs Act in Provincially-Administered Tribal Areas would change the economic picture of the region by providing an impetus to trade and industrialization.

He disclosed that a full-fledged collectorate staffed by 300 to 400 personnel would be established to facilitate the trade and industry in Provincially-Administered Tribal Areas while a dry port and manufacturing bonds (places where non-custom-paid raw material can be kept for certain period) would also be established.

“This infrastructure would connect PATA to Afghanistan and China through Khunjerab and prove to be a new vista for economic development in the region,” he argued.He felt it would prove to be a ‘bonanza and blessing’ for the people of the region and bring them on a par with the regulated and developed areas of the country.

“It is not the mere imposition of the income tax. It is rather about the mainstreaming of the entire region in terms of economic developing and regulation,” he maintained.Meanwhile, official sources confided to The News that the real stumbling block in the implementation of the act was the business of non-customs paid vehicles in Provincially-Administered Tribal Areas.

The sources said there were some 96,000 registered non-customs paid vehicles while another 50,000 such vehicles were still unregistered in the area.However, they suggested that the provincial government in consultation with the local dealers and Excise and Taxation department might approach the federal government for one-time amnesty for these vehicles.