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Postponement of ST payment thru cheque hailed

RECORDER REPORT

KARACHI: The Pakistan Readymade Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Association (Prgmea) has welcomed the Government's decision to postpone the Sales Tax General order till July 2000 which had required exporters to make all payments exceeding Rs. 50,000 through crossed cheque.

The Order was held in abeyance by Minister of Finance Shaukat Aziz at a meeting with the FPCCI in Islamabad last Saturday.

Javed Chinoy, Chairman, Prgmea (Central) in a statement described the decision as a positive step which would bring the wheels of export, stalled due to the order, in motion again.

He said that as a result of Sales Tax order, the exporters had stopped purchasing raw material because of the presence of un-registered sector in textile industry which did not issue any sales tax invoice and refused to accept payments through cheques.

Chinoy reaffirmed that the exporters believed in documentation of economy and were ready to offer full support and cooperation to any move for documentation by the government. The exporters had only opposed the order because it was enforced all of a sudden without consulting the trade and without giving them time to prepare for the new system of payment, he added.