KARACHI, June 11: All Pakistan Motor Dealers Association chairman H.M. Shahzad has criticised the government for capping of import of used cars to three years from five years.

“Cars not older than three years will definitely be very costlier and will sharply hit the importers of second cars. Consumers will prefer only locally-assembled cars at competitive rates and assemblers will again dominate the market,” he explained.

He said that import of cars was likely to range 8,000-10,000 in the 2007-08. He added that used car imports had already come down in the outgoing fiscal after the government’s decision of capping import to five years old cars from 10 years in 2006-2007 budget.

In a statement issued on Monday, he said used car importers were perturbed over sudden change in the policy and they had not been taken into confidence before making any decision.

He added that thousands of cars were already being on board to find their way into Pakistan and hundreds of cars were still waiting to be loaded on the vessels.

He urged Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz to revert the decision otherwise there would be a substantial revenue loss to the exchequer besides depriving consumers to buy a good used car at affordable price.