By Nathaniel Nartey
Executive Director of the Africa Center for Revenue Mobilization, Geoffrey Ocansey has called on the Government to scrap the E-Levy Tax and replace it with Rent Taxes.
Mr. Ocansey said the Government can also explore other options such as Night and Dawn taxes and Property Rate taxes.
These, according to him, will generate twice the expected revenue for the country than the E-Levy which he described as regressive. He told Nathaniel Nartey that the announcement of the E-Levy has led to panic withdrawals on mobile money, an indication that the policy will not work.
“With the announcement of the 1.75% levy, there was panic and people started withdrawing their MoMo. Meanwhile, other opportunities exist like rent taxes, night and dawn taxes. There are people who are renting rooms out, those doing business at night and dawn and they all do not pay taxes. There are other people who have not paid their property rates. These are all vibrant areas where the collection would have been twice what they are targeting via the digitised platforms”.
On the issue of panic withdrawals on mobile money, he said ”I did my survey around the Dome Kwabenya, Teshie-Nungua and Mantse Agbonaa. It’s still going on subtly but the first 3 days after the E-Levy announcement it was very aggressive with people wanting to take all their mobile money out because they felt the E-Levy took effect immediately”, according to the Executive Director of the Africa Center for Revenue Mobilization, Geoffrey Ocansey.