Posted by user Claudine Alcock, the Kelisa in questions was bought secondhand for only EUR700.
Sharing her excitement of buying the little car that could, Claudine shared:
“I had never heard of the make sorry!! But I love it. Its ticking at 83 500 miles (about 135,000km) on the clock. Saw another one with 995,000 miles on the clock and it’s still going!! It has a dent in the front which I will repair but apart from that its start and go!!”
If like me you weren’t aware of where Malta is or, even what it was, Malta is the largest island in an archipelago in the central Mediterranean, some 80 km (50 mi) south of the Italian island of Sicily across the Malta Channel.
The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 boosted Malta’s position as a trading post and civilian business centre, an advantage they hold today.
While there are records showing the Kelisa was exported to the UK, and that Jeremy Clarkson famously destroyed one Kelisa (see below), there’s no records of the Kelisa making a trip to Malta.
Perhaps an industrious secondhand sales man found a niche market for really cheap cars in Malta.
Another resident of Malta also chimed in to praise the car, saying the Kelisa is small enough to park easily anywhere and that if you fold the back seats down, you get a tiny little van.
Some netizens have also questioned the cheap price as it still cost RM10,000 to purchase the Kelisa while it’s only RM3,000 after conversion in Malta.
Looks like secondhand sellers in Malta may be better off shipping their stock back to Malaysia and selling it here.
