Rewrite of Customs Act no further forward

ALTHOUGH IT had been mentioned to FTW that there was a vague possibility that minister of finance, Trevor Manuel, might make some comment on the re-write of the Customs and Excise Act in his recent budget, that wasn’t to be. And while we have spent two weeks trying to get an update on the issue from the SA Revenue Service (Sars), all we have been officially told is that the revised act – originally written in 1964, and amended every year since as trade conditions went through a number of fundamental changes – is still being worked on. This still leaves the freight clearing and forwarding industry, and importers and exporters, in the awkward position of having to conduct modern-day trade under nowobsolete legislation – with no indication of when up-date legislation will be finalised.