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Govt criticised for treating frontier traders unjustly

Iqbal Khattak

Peshawar: A member of Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) executive committee on Friday criticised the federal government, saying that the Frontier traders had been denied the facilities their counterparts from Sindh, Punjab and Balochistan enjoy at the moment.

"We are treated like aliens. It looks as if there are different sets of rules for traders of different provinces," Zia-ul-Haq Sarhadi told Business Recorder.

He blasted the government's seven-and-a-half percent duty drawback for Frontier exporters. "This is of no use. Since its announcement, not a single exporter used this facility because it helped them little," Sarhadi said.

The SCCI executive committee member said that Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan exporters were offered duty drawback on the basis of tariff rate. "I don't know why the Frontier exporters are treated like this."

Doing exports in foreign currency was total loss for exporters. "Any sensible exporter will stay away from such deals," he argued, saying that there was a difference of only Rs 4 in the rate of dollar in bank and open market.

"The government will have to announce a uniform duty drawback policy for all provinces' exporters if it wants to earn foreign exchange," he said.

Underlining the importance of increase of exports, Sarhadi suggested that the military leadership should move swiftly to address Frontier exporters' problems in order to revive the economy.

He said the country's economy would largely depend on exports from the NWFP to the Central Asian Republics in the future. "This is the time we must step up efforts to occupy as much market as possible," Sarhadi pointed out.