LAHORE: The Lahore Chamber of Commerce & Industry (LCCI) has urged the government to address the reservations of commercial importers.
In a statement, the LCCI President Malik Tahir Javaid, Senior Vice President Khawaja Khawar Rashid and Vice President Zeshan Khalil said that the commercial importers were being treated under final tax regime and they were allowed audit exemption on the payment of 6 percent withholding tax. This regime is replaced with minimum tax in the budget.
Reassessment of raw material and opening of audit cases of commercial importers has also been proposed in the budget. They said that new proposals were injustice to commercial importers and the same would not be acceptable. They said that commercial importers are also feeding the local industries and their difficulties would also hit the industrial sector hard.
The LCCI office-bearers said that commercial importers import raw material for various sectors. “Bringing commercial importers into minimum tax regime will increase the cost of raw material,” they said and added that this will increase the cost of production for various sectors.
They appealed the prime minister and the finance minister to keep the final tax regime for commercial importers and reduce the withholding tax rate to four percent from 6 percent. Further, the tax rate difference between commercial and non-commercial importers should be removed in order to provide level playing field. They proposed that commercial importers should be brought into refund regime to make the things better.
