Gov’t won’t cancel e-levy – Buaben Asamoa

The Director of Communications for the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Yaw Buaben Asamoa has said the decision to go to the International Monetary Find (IMF) will not lead to cancelation of the e-levy.

He said the IMF programme will not replace Ghana’s revenue flows.

Following the announcement that Ghana was seeking support from the IMF, some analysts including the Executive Director of the Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP) Mr Benjamin Boakye said the e-levy must be abolished.

Speaking on the New Day show with Berla Mundi on TV3 Monday July 4, Mr Boakye said that it was obvious from the get go that the e-levy was not going to work.

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Asked whether the e-levy should be cancelled following the decision by the government to head to the IMF, Mr Boakye answered “The e-levy, we told government it wasn’t going to work from the start and they didn’t listen. It is part of the reasons why we woke up one day and we realized that we are getting 10 per cent.

“If you are trying to tax the poor they have more energy to resist, it is a pure economic fact. You rather want to help the poor to grow to become big and contribute tax. If you check our Gross Domestic Product (GDP), 71 per cent come from the formal sector. So what that tells you is that the leakages are at the formal sector, so trying to spend more money to target the 30 per cent of the poor bracket, you are not going to get revenue from there. It is clear from the data which government refused t look at.”

“I think it has to go,” he stressed.

But also speaking on the newspaper review segment on the New Day show with Johnnie Hughes on TV3, Monday July 4, Mr Buaben Asamoa who is a former lawmaker for Adentan, said “we will not cancel it, we will not cancel the e-levy because we need to calibrate it well and see how it will perform. It is barley a month old and going to the IMF doesn’t mean that IMF is going to replace our revenue flows, we still have to raise revenue.”

Source:3news.com