More than 30 MPs noncompliant prior to 2016 – says GRA

Mar 24, 2018 News

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By Kiana Wilburg
When it comes to compliance with the nation’s tax laws, policy leaders must be held to a higher standard. If they are noncompliant, then the citizens would be as well.
It is with this understanding in mind that Commissioner General of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA), Godfrey Statia, revealed that measures have been put in place to ensure that Guyana’s politicians are always following the letter of the law.
Statia reminded that in 2016, he was accused of “going after” opposition parliamentarians when he initiated steps to ensure their tax statements were in order. He stressed however that the tax The Commissioner General said, “I was not going after Opposition Parliamentarians. I keep saying that our leaders should be held to a higher standard and if they are noncompliant then our citizens would be as well.
“That is why I went through and doubled checked to ensure that not only the politicians but all of our public servants would have filed their tax returns. Those who did not file, they were demanded.” At the time, there were more than 30 noncompliant Members of Parliament.
Statia added, “There were instances where politicians did not file and we demanded the returns and they filed them. They came in one at a time and they filed. Because we should have our leaders in high esteem, we had one person dealing with them. It was more than half of them in Parliament and on both sides of the aisle. That has been corrected up to the end of 2016.”
The tax boss also noted that measures are in place to ensure that the nation’s policy leaders and public servants are up to date with their filings for 2017.
Additionally, the Commissioner General was reminded of the concerns of some citizens as it relates to politicians with unexplained wealth. He was asked to say if the revenue authority is paying any attention to such issues.
Statia said, “What we do with all of our returns is we do a critical analysis and whether they are politicians or other citizens, they go through the same thing. Once we find unexplained wealth, we go after it regardless of whether they are politicians or not.”
He added, “We have written a few of them about their wealth because information comes to us and so we look into it.”
Chartered Accountant and former Auditor General, Anand Goolsarran, has written extensively on the need for the Guyana Revenue Authority to step up its approach on unexplained wealth.
The Chartered Accountant had said, “Suffice it to state that too many of these persons continue to flaunt unexplained wealth with impunity. There are also many large unincorporated entities for which there are no legal requirements to file audited accounts with the GRA. This poses significant difficulties when considering the tax liabilities of the owners of these entities.”
Goolsarran said that while there is a requirement for incorporated entities to file audited accounts with GRA within a specified timeframe, and duly certified by chartered accountants in public practice, GRA must be more proactive in carrying out its own independent assessment to ascertain whether these audited accounts do indeed reflect a fair presentation of the financial condition, performance and cash flows of these entities.
The former auditor general said that GRA must be prepared to challenge these accounts rather than accept them at face value simply because they have been certified by chartered accountants.
Goolsarran also pointed to the fact that the International Monetary Fund (IMF), in one of its latest reports, highlighted that there were several weaknesses within the revenue authority.
In the area of verification of returns filed by taxpayers, the Fund noted several problems. It said that there was no automated crosschecking of internal and external information to detect and deter inaccurate reporting; no proactive initiatives to encourage accurate reporting; and no monitoring of the extent of inaccurate reporting in any of the core taxes.
In addition, the IMF found that GRA’s Customs Department was not used on a systematic basis to verify amounts reported for personal and corporate taxes. The need to monitor regularly tax revenue losses from inaccurate reporting was also highlighted, especially by business taxpayers, so that the necessary actions can be taken to ensure compliance.
Accordingly, the IMF gave a D grade for this activity which is considered the lowest level of performance.
There was no system of public or private rulings nor were cooperative compliance arrangements in place to facilitate GRA’s clarification of tax issues. There was also no legal framework to support the issuance of binding rulings nor were there any compliance gap studies for Value Added Tax (VAT).
In the face of the aforementioned, GRA’s Commissioner General, Godfrey Statia, informed this newspaper that efforts are already in place to correct such deficiencies.

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