A.B.A Fuseini, Member of Parliament for Sagnarigu
Minority to reject 1.75% MoMo levy
Ghanaians are already burdened with taxes, Minority says
Fees and charges of government services have also been increased by 15%
The Member of Parliament (MP) for Sagnarigu in the Northern Region, Alhaji Alhassan Bashir Fuseini has said Ghanaians are among the most taxed people in the West African Sub-region.
According to him, Ghanaians are already burdened with taxes therefore, the introduction of new taxes in the 2022 budget will only worsen the plight of Ghanaians.
“Let me place it on record that Ghanaians are already overburdened, in fact, Ghanaians are one of the most extortionately taxed people in the West Africa Sub-region if not the entire Africa continent. So from this background of heavy taxation on Ghanaians the least anybody would have expected in this budget is for the government to cushion them from the ravaging of COVID-19,” he stated
Meanwhile, the minority has reacted to the comment by Minister for Communication stating that people who send GHC100 are not poor, Alhaji Fuseini was wrong for saying people who send such amount are rich.
“Have we (Ghanaians) sunk so low to the point that people who send GHC100 are rich people for that matter we put them in that category? I am astonished. When we have inflicted pain on people we should not rob their wounds with salt because you are going to aggravate their injury and anguish,” he said
Ken Ofori-Atta announced the scrapping of road tolls and the introduction of E-levy to cover Mobile money transactions, remittances and other electronic transactions on November 18, 2022 in parliament.
He added that fees and charges of government services have also been increased by 15%.
“Total value of transactions for 2020 was estimated to be over GHS 500 billion Cedis compared to GH¢78 billion Cedis in 2016 just 5 years ago, while total mobile money subscribers and active mobile money users have grown by an average rate of 18% and 16% respectively between 2016 and 2019. Mr. Speaker, it is becoming clear there exists an enormous potential to increase tax revenues by bringing into the tax bracket, transactions that could be best defined as being undertaken in the “shadow economy,” he said.
“After considerable deliberations, the Government has decided to place a levy on all electronic transactions to widen the tax net and rope in the informal sector. This shall be known as the “Electronic Transaction Levy or E-Levy,” he added.
It was based on this the lawmaker said Ghanaians are already burdened with taxes.