So we all waited patiently for the Malaysian budget 2013 to be read out. We spent our afternoon waiting for a change in our automotive sector. We even felt rather positive before the announcement. All that came was subsidies, incentives, more projects, more infrastructure spending and more bonuses for the voters.
The only real automotive incentive was the extension of another year for small capacity hybrid cars. Toyota and Honda celebrated. The rest frowned. High quality diesel is still far away. EURO 2M stays and EURO 6 seems far far away from arrival at our fuel stations. Lower import taxes for cars nowhere to be seen. Incentives for owners of old smoky diesel commercial vehicles to buy new clean diesel trucks no where in sight. Incentives for taxi drivers to get low priced fuel efficiency vehicles to run daily not mentioned. The scrapping of old vehicles to allow cheaper new cars to be purchased at sensible prices not considered.
The car ownership will continue to be a burden for many lower income Malaysians and the poor will have no choice but to transport their family on a motorcycle. Many lower middle class Malaysians will still keep paying monthly instalments for their cars and not have much left in hand after 5-6 years of instalments.
