{"id":1847,"date":"2018-11-20T18:41:05","date_gmt":"2018-11-20T18:41:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/nu\/blog\/gra-responds-to-sends-call-for-tax-education-progressive-tax\/"},"modified":"2018-11-20T18:41:05","modified_gmt":"2018-11-20T18:41:05","slug":"gra-responds-to-sends-call-for-tax-education-progressive-tax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/gra-responds-to-sends-call-for-tax-education-progressive-tax\/","title":{"rendered":"GRA responds to SEND\u2019s call for tax education, progressive tax"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) launched a national campaign on October 24, 2018 to educate citizens on the need to pay taxes for national development. <\/span>The tax campaign, called \u201cOur Taxes Our Future,\u201d is to be carried out by the National Commission for Civic Education, Information Services Department and the media.<\/p>\n

The campaign launch comes two months after a report published by SEND Ghana called on the GRA to embark on tax education to improve revenue generation and enhance taxpayer satisfaction. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

In May 2018, SEND Ghana\u2019s Promoting Progressive Tax for Inclusive Development (PPTID) project conducted research to assess how progressive the prevailing tax system is and how it affects the socially excluded, youth in business start-ups, market women, Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty bene\ufb01ciaries and artisans. <\/span><\/p>\n

The research found that, apart from the general taxes, local government authorities also impose levies on marginalized groups for their participation in the market or place of business and trade. Members of marginalized groups surveyed strongly perceived the <\/span>existing tax regime as unfair. The research also found that most of the marginalized in society are not paying taxes because they believe government does not involve them in the tax formulation process. <\/span><\/p>\n

Following the launch of the research report, \u201cPromoting Progressive Tax for Inclusive Development of All,\u201d SEND Ghana met with GRA, the Ministry of Finance and parliament to deliberate on the findings and recommendations. As a result, the GRA, during its mid-year budget review, introduced three new taxes in line with SEND\u2019s research recommendations to make the current regime more progressive. <\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Emmanuel Ayifah, deputy country director of SEND Ghana, commended the GRA for honoring its commitments.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSEND Ghana commends the GRA for launching a national tax campaign to encourage Ghanaians, especially persons in the informal sector, to voluntarily honor their tax obligations to accelerate development in the country,\u201d Ayifah<\/span> said in a letter signed on behalf of SEND Ghana to the GRA. \u201cThis is in line with SEND Ghana\u2019s course to promote equality in Ghana.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In the letter, Ayifah<\/span> encouraged the GRA to continue with the tax education to ensure more informal sector workers voluntarily pay their taxes.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn applauding GRA we also urge that this national tax campaign launched would not be a one day thing, but, the sensitizations will continue until success is achieved with increasing numbers of informal workers contributing their quota into the national kitty for national development,\u201d the letter continues. \u201cIn addition, appropriate policies should be instituted and implemented to widen the tax net.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

For more please visit the PPTID research report<\/a> on the Publications section of SEND Ghana\u2019s website.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) launched a national campaign on October 24, 2018 to educate citizens on the need to pay taxes for national development. The tax campaign, called \u201cOur Taxes Our Future,\u201d is to be carried out by the National Commission for Civic Education, Information Services Department and the media. The campaign launch comes<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1848,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1847"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sendwestafrica.org\/ghana\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}