Representatives of EAC tax bodies in a group photo after the official opening of the 96th EARATC
The Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) Commissioner General, John R. Musinguzi, has appealed to the East African Revenue Authorities Technical Committee sitting in Kampala to consider strategies geared towards mobilizing revenues to fund “our budgets.”
The 96th East Africa Revenue Authorities Technical Committee (EARATC) meeting is sitting in Kampala for a week-long deliberations aimed at efficiently and effectively mobilizing revenue in the region.
The meeting precedes the 51st meeting of Commissioner Generals (EARACG) meeting which is scheduled to take place in Dar es salaam later this year.
While opening the meeting at Mestil Hotel in Kampala on Monday morning, Musinguzi saidthe vast range of expertise and experience as well as successful transformations across the region provide a very rich pool from which “we all mutually benefit in the true African spirit of brotherhood.”
“This is therefore to implore you, the technical committee to consider strategies geared towards mobilizing revenues to fund our budgets in order to deliver our economies from economic dependence. I implore you to look deeper and analyse our challenges such as the growing informal sector/hidden economy, narrow tax base, increasing arrears, smuggling, and aggressive tax planning by Multinational Corporations leading to profit shifting, among others, and propose innovative solutions to raise the much-needed revenues for our countries. The aspects of risk management and formulation of the compliance improvement plans are key to our Revenue Administration Mandate,” Musinguzi said.
According to Musinguzi, over the years, the EARACG forum has shaped the revenue administration landscape in the region and continues to pursue the goal of attaining harmonized, standardized and integrated tax administration systems among Partner States.
As such, he said, the EARATC ought to prioritize matters that will fast track this pursuit across the region.
“The discussions and directives of the forum often require dedicated and extensive work by this committee by way of collaborative knowledge and technology exchange and carrying out research on pertinent topics with a view of sharing and recommending best practices. This crucial role of the committee in our economic journey as a region and carries the potential to catapult our respective nations from economic dependence into self-sustenance as we unlock revenue streams,” he said, adding:
“It is imperative for countries in the East African Community to focus more on domestic revenue sources to fund their expenditure needs for growth and development especially in the face of changes in the priorities of some of our funders. Considering that taxes are an important source of revenue, our governments and revenue authorities should consider policies to increase the tax base, improve the ability to efficiently collect taxes, and make it easy for taxpayers to comply and pay their tax obligations.”
Musinguzi says that the URA is a keen and regular contributor to tax policy and practice in the region through these engagements and that the insights shared on revenue performance as well as new developments in tax administration across the region play a vital role in informing our strategies and approaches.
“These experiences shape our tax administration practices resulting into robust revenue generation mechanisms. I urge you consult widely during this week long engagement in order to ensure that the proposals brought forward indeed provide revenue multiplication in the year and the years to come,” he said.
