NCCE Takes Tax Education To Drivers

The National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) has held a day's tax sensitization forum for drivers in Kumasi to encourage them to pay their taxes.

The programme, jointly organized with the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), targeted members of the Ghana Private Road Transport Union (GPRTU).

It is part of the scaled-up campaign to assist the people to have better understanding of why they should live up to their tax obligations - to promote voluntary compliance.

The Commission has already had similar engagements with operators of small-scale and medium enterprises and religious organizations.

Ms. Joana Aboagyewaah Appiah, a Senior Civic Education Officer of the Commission, called for all to make sure that they lived up to their civic responsibility of paying tax on the income they earned.

She said the reluctance of many Ghanaians to do this, was making it difficult for the nation to achieve its revenue target.

Ms. Appiah complained about size of the informal sector's contribution to the nation's total tax revenue, saying, that had remained below five per cent even though the economy was dominated by informal sector players.

The GRA estimates that only about 1.2 million of Ghanaians are currently registered for tax purposes and half of the number is in the formal sector.

Ms. Appiah underlined the need for everybody to change their attitude to tax and to recognize that it was the way forward for the nation's progress.

She added that efforts at developing the country's infrastructure would struggle if the people continued to dodge tax payment.

GNA
By Stephen Asante, GNA