The minority in parliament is alleging that the government is attempting to give tax breaks worth an astounding 7 billion Ghanaian Cedis to its cronies.
Following the disclosure of a 5 billion Ghana Cedi tax waiver request that is presently being considered by the Finance Committee under the guise of incentive packages for the One District One Factory (1D1F) policy, this information was made public.
Speaking to reporters in Accra on Wednesday, Ranking Member of the Trade and Industry Committee Yussif Sulemana issued a dire warning: if the government does not end these outrageous tax breaks, the Minority will vehemently oppose any attempt to impose additional regressive taxes on Ghanaians.
“The 2024 budget is imposing taxes of GHS11 billion, and unfortunately, while we are taxing poor Ghanaians to raise this revenue, we are also granting tax waivers to friends and family members.
For example, we have about GHS5.5 billion tax exemptions waiting at the finance committee, and we have seen documents that suggest they’re bringing another GHS7 billion tax waiver request to parliament.
When you put the two together, we are talking about GHS12.5 billion tax exemptions.”
“We are concerned about the fact that you want to grant GHS12.5 billion to your friends and family members in the name of tax exemptions under 1D1F.
At the same time, you are imposing taxes of GHS11 billion. It doesn’t make sense to us, and we are saying that the tax bill they are going to introduce in this budget will face stiff opposition.
We will not allow them to impose taxes on our people.”
