KOHAT, Dec 15: Local traders have complained about the ‘loading and unloading tax’ on trucks and vehicles entering Kohat with goods for local textile mills, a cement company, oil and gas development authority and businessmen, saying it’s unjustified as it isn’t being levied in other parts of the province.

They also regretted that their repeated requests to the tehsil municipal administration for abolition of the said tax had fallen on deaf ears.

Traders told Dawn on Thursday that the levying of the ‘load and unloading tax’ on them years after its abolition across the country was unwarranted.

According to them, of late, truckers refused to pay the said tax and parked their automotive vehicles at the Hangu bypass for two days but were forced by the ‘goons’ of the government contractor into ending the protest after tax payment.They claimed that the TMA had begun levying the tax after the provincial government proposed it.

Traders said TMA officials claimed to be spending the money generated by the loading and unloading tax to improve sanitation conditions, lighting on the streets and water supply in the district but the reality was that there’s no improvement in the said services.

When contacted, an official of the TMA Imtiaz defended the levying of the loading and unloading tax, saying it was meant to improve public facilities in the district.