@local_var Really Cannot Hold Table Name ?

Hi,
I have tables named like ag97a027, ag98a027, ... where 97 and 98 is
from year 1997, 1998 and a027 is just specification of product type. I
need carry out repeated operataions over these tables. To generate
their names is easy, for example

use [P5-01]
declare @Yint int, @Y char(2), @tabName char(8)
set @Yint = 1997
while @Yint < 2002
begin
set @tabName = 'ag' + substring(convert(char(4),@Yint),3,2)+'a027'
print @tabName
set @Yint = @Yint + 1
/*
select *
from @tabName
*/
end

prints properly

ag97a027
ag98a027
ag99a027
ag00a027
ag01a027

but when I uncomment the select statement, MS-SQL server responds:
Server: Msg 137, Level 15, State 2, Line 11
Must declare the variable '@tabName'.

How to use @local_variable for browsing through tables in above
described way?

thanks
Martin