Robert Hart, Staff Reporter
THE GOVERNMENT has barred local automobile dealers from importing any motor vehicles that were in the Cayman Islands during the September onslaught of Hurricane Ivan.
According to Raymond Reese, special adviser to the prime minister and chairman of the Motor Vehicles Import Committee, the decision was taken shortly after the hurricane because of fears that water-damaged vehicles from the small island would be dumped in Jamaica.
"We are not going to be allowing them to be imported and sold to the unsuspecting public," Mr. Reese told The Gleaner on Monday. "Individuals can import, but not the dealers."
Mr. Reese pointed out that sections of the Cayman Islands were covered in water during and after the hurricane, and suggested that a large percentage of motor vehicles were likely waterlogged during the hurricane which hit that island on September 12.
PROTECTING THE CONSUMER
"The damage will not manifest itself now so we are trying to protect the consumer," he said, while assuring that "only one or two" of the relevant vehicles were brought into the island since the hurricane. In addition, he added, those vehicles were brought in by the individual buyers who are still allowed to import.
Explaining the rationale behind leaving individuals free to import vehicles, Mr. Reese said that persons should be more aware of what they are buying when they are importing vehicles for themselves. Consumers, he noted, would not necessarily be made aware of all the appropriate details when purchasing from dealers because the vehicles might not be registered as
salvaged.
Yesterday, however, Kenneth Shaw, president of the Jamaica Used Car Dealers Association, suggested that there was no new policy in the wake of the hurricane as auto dealers were already barred from importing salvaged vehicles in the revised motor vehicle policy which came into effect in July. According to the policy, "a motor vehicle dealer is not permitted to import vehicles that have been salvaged or in a damaged condition."
But in response Mr. Reese stressed that the new decision related specifically to Cayman, which was previously not a major exporter of motor vehicles to Jamaica.
