[ 2019-03-05 ]

Council of State meets President over taxes
Accra, March 4, GNA - Members of the Council of
State, Monday, called on President Nana Addo
Dankwa Akufo-Addo to deliberate pertinent national
issues, including the levels of taxes deemed to be
too high over the years.

The closed-door meeting, the first between the
President and the Council this year, discussed
among other things, current issues that have
engaged the Council's attention for urgent
consideration.

These include import taxes and the vast tax
exemptions.

Nana Otuo Siriboe II, Chairman of the Council,
announced before the meeting went into camera that
the advisory body was bringing to the President's
attention relevant matters that came up at its
meetings with stakeholders on the economy.

The Council, he disclosed, had met with the
Customs Divisions of the Ghana Revenue Authority
(GRA), the Ministry for Trade and Industry, the
Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA) and the
Ministry Of Finance to brainstorm on ways to
address the prohibitive import tax regime and
ancillary issues.

However, the Government has stated that measures
have been put in place to buck the trend and boost
revenue mobilisation to create a resilient footing
for the economy.

The President, in his recent State of the Nation
Address (SONA) to Parliament, touched on some of
the issues the Council brought before him.

He said the biggest challenge to the management of
the economy was the issue of revenue
mobilisation.

Additionally, he said, the Tax Exemption Policy
had affected fiscal stability and revenue
generation.

“In the last eight years, tax exemptions in
respect of import duty, import VAT, import NHIL
and domestic VAT have grown from three hundred and
ninety-two million Ghana cedis (GH¢392
million), that is 0.6% of GDP in 2010, to
GH¢4.66 billion, that is 1.6% of GDP in
2018,” the President had said.

The President explained that the figures did not
include exemptions from the payment of corporate
and individual income taxes, concessions on tax
rates, petroleum tax reliefs, customs tax
exemptions enjoyed by diplomatic missions, and
waiver of processing charges at the ports.

“If we continue at this rate, in less than
16 years, half of Ghana’s revenue base will
be given away as tax exemptions.

"This is not sustainable, and we intend to do
something about it to reverse the trend.”

Thus, Nana Otuo Siriboe expressed the hope that
the meeting with the President would address the
two issues, saying they needed the urgent
attention of the Government.

The Council used the opportunity to commend the
President for reopening the Obuasi Gold Mines,
helping to restore peace to Dagbon and the
installation of a new Ya-Na for the Dagbon
Traditional Area.

It also patted the President on his back on the
creation and inauguration of six regions, as well
as the timely appointment of Regional Ministers
and their Deputies.

Source - GNA

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