Oh that one. My mistake
Chinese government have stronger protection for their car makers, yet people still go to china because of the market. No car maker in the world has a level playing field. Local makes will always be given prefernce. Japan, Korea will give preference to their cars. BMW price their cars expensive, but their market is export, hence even their people use Kia.

Also, no government in the world is idiotic to put their industry out to die. Lets say you remove everything for Proton, level playing field. Proton compete, but then people still will not buy proton because now can buy cheaper dugong. Why buy proton since dugong cheaper now. Proton dies out like Chrysler. Now, if you are a politician, making policies, how are you going to face 30k odd proton workers (including manufacturing parts, service, etc) saying, because I want cheaper dugong made by JAPS or THAIS, I rather see 30k MALAYSIAN workers merempat. 30k workers got families, got sedara-mara. As stupid as politicians are, they are not that stupid to loose voters. 

Same thing with MAS, same with Petronas. Will always get better treatment. Every country does this. If you don't do this, then you yourself will merempat. Lets say, that you have nothing to do with auto industry, working as grocery shop/hardware shop/own business. So now, you have 30k MALAYSIANS jobless, who is going to buy at your shop/use your facilities.

That is why during Malaysian economic crisis, Tun M say-spend spend. IMF idiot say, keep-keep. Logically when in crisis, you keep money to build revenue. However, if money does not circulate, economy will cripple. If everyone stopped going to McD because of crisis for 1 year, that shop will close. When I got the 3 gen's past accord 2.0 year 2000. Honda so desperate, they put in accessories you cannot find now. Bodylex massger, wood trim, parking pole, Vkool, can put downpayment with credit card some more, fog light and some sort of skyactive guard for 5 years. All free included in price. This was still during economic crisis. Then in 2002, economy got better, honda stopped giving bodylex massager, wood trim, parking pole. Even radio also aftermarket. Fog light not included. Seats don't have cloth cover. Forget skyactive.

If you want to get best value car, see which car comes with the most accessories, and balance with the brand value. As I see it, my new current gen 2010 Accord has less stuff compared to the 2000 Accord. Vkool was factory tinted. Now need to go tint yourself. Skyactiv, no more there. Massage seats-can forget it. When car makers are desperate, they put a lot of stuff. That is why cherry got tons of stuff, people still don't buy because brand value worse than proton. Honda, Nissan, Toyota give so little now because people rate the brand value too high. That is consumer's fault.

At the way Toyota, Honda and to an extent Nissan swindling consumers giving little stuff, I don't see my next car will be an Accord. Then again, it may be a rebadge Accord Kia/Hyundai considered good value as they have tons of stuff. I bet you that if Kia/Hyundai are at H, T and N position, they and H, T, and N at K/H position, H, T and N will give more stuff to consumers.

So, in your quest to have "fair and level playing field" for car makers, you are actually not being fair to your own people working in your own country. So i quote Tun M said: "Free trade can be fair, but Fair trade cannot be free". I don't want Malaysia to be like Indonesia with the huge income disparity or like EU and UK now, all bankrupt because all buy from China but China don't buy back from them.

Please read the link I gave and the pages following that. Then got problem ask back. I don't want to write same thing over and over again.

Only if all Malaysian can think like the way you did.
Many ignorant Malaysian think protection isn't good while the fact is, every gov in this world will mati2 protect their own local entity because if we too dependable with foreign stuff, we hardly can go anywhere.
The most major problem with Malaysian is they are skeptical and become so negative with their own people product unlike people in developed country. W/o protection, our local entity hardly can expend their business globally.

People need to getting realistic in life. My principle is simple, just spend base on budget in your pocket.
No one force you to buy Dugong, Suprima or any other expensive car if your budget is tight. Don't ever think if gov abolish car tax structure in future, even clerk with RM2k income also can use Honda Civic. Life isn't that simple.

Every country got their own tax structure. We might pay more for car tax but we pay less income tax compare to most country. At least with car tax, we can control it. Not to mentioned, our post cost when owning the car is actually a lot cheaper compare to other country. Rather become negative and keep blaming why gov create Proton bla bla bla, it better if we can become critical in forcing Proton or any other local entity brand in moving forward. This company got potential to bring more money flow in into our country which will beneficial to all Malaysian.