Excise Act Malaysia 1976

Excise laws are another indirect taxation legislation administered by the Customs department. Commonly referred to as excise duty instead of tax, this applies to goods manufactured in the country (referred to in the Act as Federation).
Excise duty is applicable to a limited number of goods and these are listed in the Excise Duties Order 2012, Schedule. There are only four type of goods subject to excise duty, rates being different to each of these goods. They are 4 categorys :1. Beer, Wines and Spirits, Fermented beverages, Undenatured Ethyl alcohol; 2. Tobacco products like Cigars, Cigarettes, Smoking tobacco including Water pipe tobacco; 3. Motor vehicles for transport of people, motorcycles and 4. Playing cards and Mahjong tiles.
Excise duties are quite common in other countries too but mostly are applicable to goods that are considered harmful to health, products that relatively wealthy members of society can afford and would contribute to the coffers of the govt or products that need to be controlled for the well being of family and society.

See Wikipaedia on Excise duty : As a deterrent, excise is typically directed towards three broad categories of harm:

- health risks from abusing toxic substances (thus making it a kind of sumptuary tax); typically this includes tobacco and alcoho.l
-environmental damage (thus acting as a green tax); this usually includes fossil fuels (such as petrol).
-socially damaging / morally objectionable activity (thus making it a type of vice tax or sin tax); usually this includes gambling, and can include prostitution (including solicitation and pimping) in places where it is legal.

Monies raised through excise may be earmarked for redress of specific social costs commonly associated with the product or service on which it is levied. Tobacco tax revenues, for example, might be spent on government anti-smoking campaigns, or healthcare for cancer, heart-disease, vascular disease, lung disease, and so on.
Targets of taxation : 1. Tobacco, Alcohol and Gasoline; 2. Narcotics; 3. Gambling; and 4. Prostitution. 

no plus ones

GST - A Right Decision to Replace Sales Tax and Service Tax legislation

Sales tax had been in effect in Malaysia since 1972 and Service Tax was implemented in 1975. Both these taxes as the name implies were targeted at different industries. Sales tax applied to goods imported or manufactured locally. Coverage however was not on all manufacturing activities unless prescribed in the Schedule. Service tax applied to services provided locally by local businesses.

There were inherent weaknesses in the implementation and enforcement of Sales tax legislation. Activities had to be considered as manufacturing as defined in the Act. It did not apply to the manufacturing of all kinds of goods and even when goods were included, their final use precluded taxation. It applied on the sale value at manufacturing level which means marketing and trading activities and entities were excluded.

Service tax applied to services defined as prescribed services and listed in the Schedule to be liable.

Rates too were different. In the case of Sales tax the rates had been revised several times but basically were at 5%, 10% or in very limited case 25%. Service tax was standard at 5% until revised effective 1.1. 2011 to 6%.

Goods and Services Tax or GST which replaced both Sales and Service Tax has helped simplify indirect taxation by a single taxation and single law as well as overcome issues of tax shifting and avoidance. Instead of Customs spending time examining to see if transactions had bypassed taxation through proxy businesses or being underpriced at manufacturer's levels or whether business activities were considered as 'manufacturing' or Services were as prescribed, GST is all inclusive and self policing.

GST Act 2014 Act 762 came into force effective 1 April 2015 by Gazette No P.U.(B) 320