Government may not implement E-Levy on February 1 as projected
Government has admitted that the proposed tax on electronic transactions may not be implemented from February 1, 2022, as projected.
This is due to delays in passing the tax by parliament, the decision has affected the Ghana Revenue Authority in finalizing the necessary stakeholder engagement as well as instituting the cloud system that will aid independent monitoring of collections by the telcos.
Minister of State at the Finance Ministry, Charles Adu Boahen, has however, indicated that despite the possible delay, government is confident about achieving the GHS 7 billion end of year target.
‘We’ve the engaged telcos, we’ve engaged our brothers across the aisle, we’ve engaged you know, the citizens of Ghana, we’ve been all traveling over the holidays and we’ve listened to what the people have to say, so we are very positive that when we go back to parliament this week, we will get the E-Levy approved so we can start to implement it. It’s a key government policy and its a key part of our budget’, he said.
Meanwhile, former Finance Minister, Seth Terkper, has disclosed that the e-levy will not address the fiscal or financing challenges of the country even in the short term.
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According to him, the country will have to do more to address the rising debt and high fiscal deficits and not rely only on the e-levy in addressing the country’s revenue challenges.
Speaking at the PFM tax Africa dialogue on Ghana’s economic outlook for 2022, Mr. Terkper said a critical strategy in addressing the fiscal challenges is the adoption of an effective expenditure management system and not just cutting expenditure.
“The e-levy is not going to resolve the fiscal challenge that is affecting the country, you saw the arrears, that’s the context, the past where we have had crisis there was one tax instrument that we have often used. That’s a temporary tax which is brought in within context of whether a home grown policy or an IMF programme and it has a sunset clause meant to last two years or so.
“And to note, we are not talking about the problem that we are going to resolve within the 2022 budget period, no, the situation we have, if you compared it to the past situation that we have had. So gradual that we even allow the e-levy, so I’m saying that we have to look beyond it because its not the only solution,” he said.
