Featured FIA identifies 20 car importers involved in money laundering

[Kabira]

KARACHI: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has reportedly prepared a list of at least 20 reconditioned car importers who, it claims, have been involved in the Hawala and Hundi transfers of about Rs40 billion.

“None of the car dealers (importing reconditioned cars) maintained any legal payment ledger for the transactions,” said an FIA source.

It was learnt that over a span of seven years, the car dealers have collectively sent Rs40 billion abroad via illegal channels. The sources have confirmed that a number of key business tycoons used Hawala and Hundi channels to make payments to the tune of billions of rupees.

“A majority of transactions via illegal channels were made to Khalid Solangi Group based outside of Pakistan,” the source confirmed, saying that the agency has reached out to the Interpol for the arrest of Solangi.

The source maintained that the leads were divulged, interrogating the arrested criminals in Hawala and Hundi cases. “Pakistanis buying real estate outside the country were also assisted via Hawala and Hundi channels.”

The FIA team carried out a raid in Gulzar-e-Hijri area of the city to arrest an accused identified as Naqash for his involvement in Hawala and Hundi activities. “We recovered a huge cache of national and foreign currency from his house during the raid,” said the Director FIA Zone Sindh Munir Ahmed Shaikh.

He said that other than Chinese, Saudi, US and other foreign currencies, Rs 2,072,000 were also recovered during the raid.

FIA identifies 20 car importers involved in money laundering

KARACHI: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has reportedly prepared a list of at least 20 reconditioned car importers who, it claims, have been involved in the Hawala and Hundi transfers of about

profit.pakistantoday.com.pk

 

[TNT]

Majority businesses in Pakistan are tax chor and then they cry about taxes.

 

[The Accountant]

If they keep on following this and get this sorted out it will be a huge catch. This hundi and hawala are most likely paid for cars imported illegaly through chaman border otherwise, taxes on cars are based on engine capacity therefore, it dont save them money paying through hawala (atleast in terms of taxes).

 

[Pandora]

This is the reason they start barking when govt talks about tax reforms and documentation of black economy. Almost 60% of our economy is running on tax evasion and hawala hundi. These people are big fish not small fries who run small shops. All those middle men and importers are the big fish that need to be monitored.

 

[313ghazi]

This is standard process in the import of vehicles. I suspect most of the money used to pay for these big imported vehicles has come this way.

 

[blueazure]

yes


hawala and hundi was used almost exclusively to send money abroad to import vehicles

and at the time of clearance, the importers had to pay nearly 100 percent of C and F value as CUSTOM and DUTIES to the national exchequer

my only question -
when customs was taking payment of duties( and made billions in the process), why didnt they inquire about the mode of payment ?

 

[blueazure]

This is the reason they start barking when govt talks about tax reforms and documentation of black economy. Almost 60% of our economy is running on tax evasion and hawala hundi. These people are big fish not small fries who run small shops. All those middle men and importers are the big fish that need to be monitored.

60 to 70 percent of pakistan's economy is 'undocumented' aka cash based

you cannot stop this unless you ban cash

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our neighbors in the east tried to kill the black economy by banning cash and eventually stalled the main economy as well since the two are interlinked

 

[blueazure]

This is standard process in the import of vehicles. I suspect most of the money used to pay for these big imported vehicles has come this way.

this was the only process to import vehicles from japan

customs and FBR knew it ( they were making millions from it too in the form of TAXES and DUTIES)

 

[Pandora]

60 to 70 percent of pakistan's economy is 'undocumented' aka cash based

you cannot stop this unless you ban cash

-------

our neighbors in the east tried to kill cash and eventually crashed the main economy as well since the two are interlinked

There are plenty of ways to document cash based economy. CNIC requirement for any thing above 50000 purchase was a brilliant idea. It is always impossible to document entire economy. Even in a country like Australia lots of people do business via cash to evade tax but those or retailers. We need to target wholesalers and importers who evade the tax most not the shop owners.

 

[El Sidd]

Always Karachi.

Tsk Tsk Tsk

 

[niaz]

In my humble opinion, we have misused the term money laundering. The accepted definition of Money Laundering among international circles is:

“Money laundering is the illegal process of making large amounts of money generated by criminal activity, such as drug trafficking or terrorist funding, appear to have come from a legitimate source. The money from the criminal activity is considered dirty, and the process "launders" it to make it look clean”. In Pakistan however, flouting the Foreign Exchange regulations is also considered money laundering.

For example, if I sell property owned by me (house thru legal inheritance say value about 1 core or about £50,000/-); it would be quite difficult for me to get the money transferred to UK where I live via banking channels. I would be forced to arrange its withdrawal from Pakistan in $5,000/- lots which is the official limit one can take abroad at one time and it may take years. On the other hand ‘Havala’ or ‘ Hundi’ without any hassle.

We would have to wait & see if the money transferred by the Car Importers was obtained through criminal activity or it was simply the case of money smuggling by rich people who have no confidence in Pakistan’s currency and want to keep money abroad in hard currency.

Flouting Currency regulation is a criminal offense and comes under ‘Smuggling’ but does not come under the ‘Money laundering' and carries a much lighter penalty. That is why despite all the efforts, it still goes on. I personally heard Imran Khan advising people to use Havala for currency transactions during the 2014-2016 Dharna at Islamabad because he wanted to undermine the PMLN gov't.

 

[blueazure]

There are plenty of ways to document cash based economy. CNIC requirement for any thing above 50000 purchase was a brilliant idea. It is always impossible to document entire economy. Even in a country like Australia lots of people do business via cash to evade tax but those or retailers. We need to target wholesalers and importers who evade the tax most not the shop owners.

yes

the sick psychopaths and control freaks sitting in govt want every transaction as electronic so it can be monitored and taxed eventually

cash is a hurdle for these desires


australia, btw, is a poster child for this global experiment . lockdowns have essentially killed its economy

 

[blueazure]

Flouting Currency regulation is a criminal offense and comes under ‘Smuggling’ but does not come under the ‘Money laundering' and carries a much lighter penalty. That is why despite all the efforts, it still goes on. I personally heard Imran Khan advising people to use Havala for currency transactions during the 2014-2016 Dharna at Islamabad because he wanted to undermine the PMLN gov't.

yes sir

im trying to find that video grab from 2014 dharna

basically, what was perfectly kosher and legit in dharna days is now haraam and forbidden



typical uturn, nothing to see here sir

 

[hasan59]

If I am not wrong the baggage rules (which facilitate car imports whether new or reconditioned) have been amended. Now the expat whose Passport is shown as the importer has to provide a money trail from his bank to pay for the vehicle. Previously dealers used to pay nominal fee to expat to get particulars for using his name and then paying for the car from their sources. As far as I know you cannot simply import cars like LEDs or ACs etc. FBR can easily find out who paid for the car I. e EXPAT or some 3rd party. They are just happy collecting custom duties in Rs while Dollars are leaving the country to fund car imports. I find many stories in this forum to be half cooked unfortunately.

 

[Pandora]

yes

the sick psychopaths and control freaks sitting in govt want every transaction as electronic so it can be monitored and taxed eventually

cash is a hurdle for these desires


australia, btw, is a poster child for this global experiment . lockdowns have essentially killed its economy

There are examples where countries have managed to eliminate cash based economy. Sweden being prime example and has made strides on that domain. If govt targets wholesalers are tax the goods at source then there is no need to run after individual shop owners. I fully support documentation of economy otherwise we will never be able to rid ourselves the curse of low revenue collection. Undocumented economy is also the biggest source of money laundering and dollar flights out of the country. Right now half of Pakistani economy is undocumented we need to document at least 70-80% to achieve a resilient and sustainable economy.

As for Australian economy failing i dont know where you get your data but that is not true. Every citizen who was struggling was provided 2400$ every month and those small business who were unable to pay employees were given 3000$ per employee. Economies like Australia are very resilient mainly bcz of diverse exports portfolio and easy access to financial institution to get required financing. You are not Talking about a third world country here. This is not the first time world has gone into recession and economies will recover. Saying that Australian economy is killed is total baloney.