Private sector hails Voluntary Compliance Window
The Malawi Confederation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry (MCCCI) has hailed the Voluntary Compliance Window which is an opportunity are afforded by the Malawi Revenue Authority (MRA) to tax defaulters.
The tax authority in September announced it would avail an opportunity to tax defaulters to pay their taxes under the window without being penalised through interest and criminal prosecution.
Responding to an e-mailed questionnaire on Friday, the private sector umbrella body’s chief executive officer, Chancellor Kaferapanjira, noted that the window has proven to bring out benefits to both the tax authorities, who are now able to collect the tax revenue they would unlikely collect, and the taxpayers for avoiding possible embarrassment in countries where similar initiatives have been implemented.
“The concept is indeed an opportunity for the taxpayers who defaulted before to make their liabilities good without being incriminated.
Reputation is valuable in business and evasion of public humiliation amounts to social capital. As MCCCI, we would certainly want MRA to collect all the taxes due from various economic agents for government to run its various functions,” said Kaferapanjira.
He, however, hoped that such taxpayers will be given Tax Clearance Certificates to enable them to start a new clean life.
Failure to pay taxes constitutes a criminal offence and can lead to jail sentences in the case of natural persons or huge penalties where artificial persons or corporations are concerned, but MRA has opened a window to tax defaulters to pay their taxes without any penalties between November 1 2013 and January 31 2014.
According to MRA, the objective of the window is to create an environment for increasing and improving the tax compliance culture, which will in turn broaden the tax base.
The tax collecting body also noted that the window will offer an opportunity to normalise the tax affairs of those that were filing but became non-compliant due to unfavourable conditions for the past few years.
But Kaferapanjira in the e-mail pointed out that it is not acceptable to use tax money to enrich individuals at various levels of government.
He noted that it is sad that while MRA tries its best to fulfil its mandate of collecting tax revenue on behalf of government, vultures in government are preying on those resources.
He urged government to use the revenue resources collected from the private sector for the delivery of services to the public, which includes the private sector itself.
