The Minister of Finance, Mr. Ken Ofori Atta, has lamented the profound disinformation on the suggested electronic transaction levy (E-levy) and said it affected the acceptance and passage.
He said the rejection of the e-levy was caused by the widespread of twisted sources of information and that the issue intimidated to reject the country of the needed revenue for development.
Mr. Ken Ofori Atta, speaking at the fifth government town hall meeting on the suggested levy in Ho, acclaimed that the objection to the levy has drawn up plans to provide advantageous ways for the rejection of the levy, and placed the issue as a desperate way to rob the people.
The Minister said despite the fact, returns from the e-levy lessen when compared with other sources of the country’s revenue, it would permit the “consistency to move forward and take clearly the reins of development into our hands.”
“We must help bring on the E-levy to be able to transform our economy, as the E-levy has become a battle ground.”
He further expressed the awful outcome of objecting the levy and said the misinformation had affected the nation’s credit integrity.
He said the E-levy would help the government pay for interests and services on it’s loans for which the nation had, for running a budget shortage, in a generation where e- marketing had significantly grown.
Mr. Ken Ofori Atta said the suggested levy would broaden the tax net, also with other digital economic-development help rope in all permitted tax contributors.
He said, “You don’t have to spite small changes, an opportunity to burden shares as a society to move forward.”
The Minister again said the levy would also be used in support of future governments, to gear unemployment and infrastructural development.
“We should not use excuse as a way to run from our problem, but as a way to address it. It calls for some very sober discussion on our role in nation-building,” he said.
Mr. Pius Enam Hadzide,the CEO of the National Youth Authority, asked for the E-levy to be considered as the nation’s youth were suffering from the rungs of unemployment.
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Again, he asked the youth to inspire upon their MPs to approve the suggested levy, and that”it is unfair to pass the budget and the appropriation but not the money that would fund it.” He said the intervention which includes the ten billion Youstart and the youth entrepreneurial programme, awaits the breath of the proposed levy.
Various ministers raised their views on the approval of the proposed levy at the meeting, these ministers included ;Mr. Peter Amewu, the Minister for Railway development, Mr. Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, Minister for information and also Dr. Archibald Yao Letsa, the Volta Regional Minister.
Also, officers of the Ghana Revenue Authority were present at the meeting to help understand the concept of the tax.
