Amend constitution to disqualify tax defaulters

Kasoa (C/R), March 30, GNA - People who wait until the 'eleventh hour' to settle their taxes should be disqualified from Presidential and Parliamentary election and prosecuted without fear or favour. This is one of the surest ways the nation could ensure that tax evaders honoured their financial obligations to the state.

Mr. Raymond E. K. Tsotome, Awutu-Effutu-Senya District Director of the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE), made the suggestion at Kasoa on Thursday.

He called for the amendment of the Constitution and other statutes to deal with defaulters since Ghanaians who refuse to pay their taxes rush to redeem such debts only at the time they were prepared to contest elections.

The NCCE District Director described such people as 'wicked and unpatriotic' and said they should be made to face the music so that they would not take the nation for granted any longer after serving their prison terms.

Mr. Tsotome said that with the country's democracy gradually gaining firm roots, we must initiate bold and workable moves that would strengthen the democratic dispensation for the benefit of posterity. "We must shun cheats of all forms, especially tax evasion and other serious economic offences against the state so that we can mobilize adequate revenue to meet the socio-economic requirements of the nation within the next 50 years to come", Mr. Tsotome added.

He was addressing over 120 Chemical Sellers drawn from Kasoa and its environs at a tax education campaign initiated by the NCCE at Kasoa. It was designed to instil a sense of voluntary tax-payment discipline in and around Kasoa.

Mr. Tsotome announced plans to intensify public education on Government policies and programmes to keep the people abreast with issues.