Don’t increase taxes without creating avenue for people to make more money - Kofi Adams to govt

Kofi Adams, the Member of Parliament(MP) for Buem Constituency in the Oti Region has lashed out at President Akufo-Addo for increasing taxes in the 2021 budget without first creating an avenue for Ghanaians to make more money.

According to him, Ghanaians are worse-off now to demand from them to pay extra taxes after enjoying free water and electricity which they believed to be a gift from the government as many have lost their jobs and businesses.

“The reason why the government provided free water and electricity, it has now become worse for the government to tax the people. Those who were asked to stay home during the early stage of the COVID-19 have now lost their jobs”.

“Some of them may have worked during the partial lockdown but now most people have lost their jobs and the companies are not back on their feet again. You have not created an avenue for the people to make more money before you tax them; even in their struggle to survive as companies and as individuals, asking them to pay more taxes is not reasonable,” he chided.

Speaking on Okay FM’s 'Ade Akye Abia' Morning Show, Kofi Adams reminded the government that Ghanaians are still in very difficult times to ask them to pay more taxes.

“If you go to many countries, this is the time they are giving freebies to their people. They are giving cheques to their people to cushion their lives. This is not the time for the government to tell Ghanaians that the freebies they provided during the partial lockdown, the people should pay taxes on them,” he charged.

“Any other taxes the government has introduced, I don’t understand because if you go round to listen to the concerns of business folks and those who don’t have any employment, I don’t think that this level of taxation will help anybody in the country,” he said.

He, however, charged the Akufo-Addo government to remove some of the taxes and redirect some of them to profit rather than asking the people to pay more taxes before finding means to make a profit.