{"id":19740,"date":"2026-10-18T09:00:35","date_gmt":"2026-10-18T07:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/?p=19740"},"modified":"2026-10-16T14:49:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T12:49:09","slug":"disability-cars-customs-egypt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/disability-cars-customs-egypt\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018We wish we had paid full duty\u2019: Disability cars face partial releases and fines exceeding their value"},"content":{"rendered":"

In September 2026, families of people with disabilities renewed their appeals on social media, more than two years after their cars were detained at ports. During the preceding year, customs had released around 9,000 vehicles while retaining thousands more, whose accumulating storage charges have, in some cases, exceeded the price of the cars themselves.<\/p>\n

The crisis began in May and June 2024, when the Customs Authority stopped releasing cars imported in the names of people with disabilities. On 24 July 2024, Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly announced a suspension of imports pending new rules, citing vehicles imported in their names and then sold to ineligible buyers. The rules were issued in October 2024 and releases resumed in January 2025. However, those who did not meet the new requirements, including people who had at some point received Takaful and Karama benefits, saw their vehicles remain at the ports as charges mounted. Two families tell Zawia3 what that means in everyday life, while customs officials, parliamentarians and dealers offer conflicting figures for the remaining vehicles: around 12,000, fewer than 3,000, or \u2018tens of thousands\u2019.<\/p>\n

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A car at Port Said<\/h2>\n

Zeinab Khalifa, 55, Yara\u2019s mother, tells Zawia3 that she and her husband had to buy a disability-exempt car two years ago so they could transport their daughter around Hurghada, where the family lives. Their old car had begun breaking down, reached the end of its useful life and become a financial burden.<\/p>\n

Since Yara became ill at the age of 12, the family had never used her \u2018car letter\u2019, the exemption document allowing a person with a disability to import a vehicle free of customs duty. They relied on their old car until someone offered to buy the letter from the couple, precisely the circumvention the government says it is fighting. They refused. They sold their old car and borrowed additional money. Yara\u2019s father paid EGP 550,000, approximately $11,400, for the new vehicle, only to discover that it had been detained in May 2024.<\/p>\n

\u2018After the car was shipped from Korea and arrived at Port Said, we were surprised by the customs detention decision,\u2019 Zeinab says. Since then, the couple have tried every means of securing its release, without success.<\/p>\n

Their ordeal did not end with detention. The family was also required to pay storage fees, charged by ports for goods remaining in their yards and described by car owners and parliamentarians as fines. According to Zeinab, these reached around EGP 110,000, approximately $2,280, during 2025, as a condition of collecting the car. The couple travelled to Port Said last year and paid the amount, hoping to receive it. Customs officials nevertheless refused to hand it over because Yara had received Takaful and Karama benefits.<\/p>\n

Zeinab says her daughter received those benefits for only two years. The Social Solidarity Ministry stopped them four years ago, before the car was bought, after determining that the family\u2019s income was high. \u2018Although that is recorded on their website, they are holding us accountable for benefits that stopped years ago.\u2019 The family has still not received the car despite paying the charge, and a further year and a half of charges has accumulated. \u2018We wish we had bought it with full duty paid, rather than being worn down all these years until the car turned into scrap,\u2019 Zeinab says. A \u2018free\u2019 car, in this usage, means one imported with all duties paid.<\/p>\n

The detention has compounded the family\u2019s transport difficulties. Zeinab explains that the paved road is some distance from their home. Getting Yara and her wheelchair there requires her father to carry her down the stairs from the third floor because there is no lift, while her mother goes to find a taxi. Taxi drivers frequently refuse them because accommodating the wheelchair requires opening the boot and getting out of the car.<\/p>\n

The family needs to travel with Yara continually for physiotherapy sessions and medical follow-ups. She cannot go out in Hurghada without transport. With her mother retired and her pension insufficient for her daughter\u2019s needs, taxis add to the costs. Yara has recently stopped attending physiotherapy and now sees the street only at long intervals. \u2018My daughter is confined at home. Punish the person who actually did something wrong,\u2019 Zeinab says.<\/p>\n

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A discontinued benefit holds up a car<\/h2>\n

Customs\u2019 refusal to release the vehicle because of Takaful benefits is not an individual employee\u2019s interpretation. According to a letter seen by Al Arabiya Business, on 12 January 2025 the Customs Authority\u2019s head issued a decision implementing a meeting chaired by Madbouly on 12 December 2024. It required remaining disability-exempt cars at ports to be re-exported, classified as abandoned goods or auctioned, and applied to recipients of cash support under Takaful and Karama. On 23 February 2025, Sherif al-Kilani, deputy finance minister for tax policy and supervisor of the Customs Authority, halted those procedures. Instructions to Red Sea and Southern Region customs prohibited \u2018any procedures, whether re-export, referral to abandoned goods or sale by auction\u2019, without first referring the matter to the authority\u2019s head and then the finance minister. \u2018Anyone who violates this shall be referred immediately for investigation.\u2019 The vehicles therefore remained at the ports, neither released, returned nor sold. (Source<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n

The published letter does not specify whether the decision covers people whose benefits stopped before importation, as in Yara\u2019s case. In the same report, Osama Abul Magd, head of the Egyptian Automobile Dealers Association, said beneficiaries had filed lawsuits arguing that the conditions were not in force when their vehicles were imported and could not be applied retroactively.<\/p>\n

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From dollar liquidity to \u2018abuse\u2019<\/h2>\n

A month before Madbouly\u2019s announcement, customs had already detained thousands of imported cars. On 26 June 2024, Cairo24 reported cases of vehicles held at ports, including those belonging to Mokhtar Salem and Saad Ahmed Zaki. Iman Karim, general supervisor of the National Council for Persons with Disabilities, commented that the detention was temporary, intended to collect dollar liquidity, and that the cars would subsequently be released. (Source<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n

The official explanation a month later was different. On 24 July 2024, Madbouly announced a halt to disability-car imports, saying vehicles were imported in beneficiaries\u2019 names but sold to other, ineligible people. He said the aim was to regulate the disability-car system and ensure the cars reached those genuinely entitled to them, without setting a duration for the suspension. Khaled Saad, secretary-general of the Egyptian Automobile Manufacturers Association, estimated to Zawia3 at the time that 90% of these vehicles were driven by beneficiaries\u2019 relatives. Abul Magd put the number detained at ports at around 13,000. (Source 1<\/a>; Source 2<\/a>; Source 3<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n

On 9 October 2024, the Cabinet approved an amendment to Article 75 of the executive regulations of Law No. 10 of 2018 on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, issued under Prime Ministerial Decision No. 2733 of 2018. The amendment was enacted through Decision No. 3500 of 2024, published on 21 October 2024. To qualify for exemption from customs duty and value-added tax, applicants must hold a disability identification and integrated services card issued by the Social Solidarity Ministry, as well as a medical report containing their details and assessing whether they can drive themselves or require another driver. Applicants must declare that they have not received a customs exemption for a car during the five years preceding the application and that they will not combine this exemption with others provided under different laws. The applicant or a first-degree relative must hold an account at Nasser Social Bank or another bank approved by the Central Bank, opened at least a year before the application, with a deposit no smaller than the vehicle\u2019s price when the exemption is granted. The Real Estate Registration Authority must also refuse to execute powers of attorney to manage a car or individual means of transport registered in the name of a person with a disability. (Source 1<\/a>; Source 2<\/a>; Source 3<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n

The amendment limited imported vehicles to a maximum age of three years, including the year of manufacture, with engine capacity capped at 1,200 cc for petrol, diesel and hybrid cars and 200 kilowatts for electric vehicles. It excluded cars located in free zones. Customs Law provisions apply if a vehicle is seized and its owner with a disability is found to have sold it or handed it to someone not entitled to drive it.<\/p>\n