[ 2014-11-20 ]

Minority walks out as Parliament passes 17.5% petroleum tax
Parliament has passed a bill presented by the
Finance Minister, Seth Terkper that will see an
imposition of 17.5 percent tax on selected
petroleum products.

The Special Petroleum Tax law is part of tax
measures adopted by government to increase revenue
generation and improve efficiency on revenue
collection from petroleum products.

The law authorises the Ghana Revenue Authority to
collect the tax, which would be paid into the
Consolidated Fund.

The petroleum products to be affected, according
to the Finance Ministry includes: petrol, diesel,
liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), natural gas and
kerosene.

Delivering the budget for the 2015 financial year
to Parliament on Wednesday, the Minister presented
the bill to the House under a certificate of
urgency.

The Speaker immediately referred the bill to the
Parliament’s Select Committee on Finance the
same day after which it was approved by the
Committee for the House to consider it.

MINORITY WALK OUT
After going through a third reading, the bill was
unanimously approved by the Majority in Parliament
without the Minority taking part.

The Minority had earlier, after engaging in heated
debate to make their case against the bill, staged
a walk out over the Majority’s insistence to
pass the bill.

Efforts by the First Deputy Speaker, Ebo Barton
Odro, to get the Minority to rescind their
decision, yielded no result.

The Minority strongly argued the tax will impose
further hardships on Ghanaians, who are already
suffering the brunt of the economic challenges.

NPP Member of Parliament for Sekondi, Paapa Owusu
Ankomah told Joy News they had to stage the walk
out because no matter how good their argument is,
it was not enough to persuade government to take a
second look at the decision.

“This is not the time to impose this kind of
hardship when workers are complaining,” he
said.

Deputy Minority Leader Dominic Nitiwul stated
categorically that the Minority “will go to the
streets to ensure that the people of Ghana support
us…to ensure that this tax is rejected”.

Osei Kyei-Mensa-Bonsu, Minority Leader, described
the decision as “appalling” and said the
budget, which is supposed to be pro-poor has
rather proven that government “doesn’t care
about the poor”.

But the Majority felt their colleagues on the
other side were overblowing the issue, which end
result would benefit the nation.

The bill was subsequently passed by a one-sided
house and the president to assent it today. This
means the implementation of the new policy takes
effect tomorrow.

POSSIBLE EFFECTS OF THE TAX
The tax is expected to lead to marginal price
increases in petroleum products at the ex-pump.
Premix fuel – nil
RFO – nil
LPG - -9.8%
Premium - 3%
Kerosene – 2.8%
Gasoil – 3%
MGO - 3.2%
EXPECTED REVENUE FROM THE TAX
An amount of about GHc1.541 billion is expected to
be realized from the implementation of the tax
between November, 2014 and December, 2015.
According to the Finance Ministry, the amount
would be used to support the implantation of the
2015 budget to meet social interventions goals

Source - MyjoyOnline

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