Move to Check Tax Evasion: IRS Pushes for Tax Courts

The Acting Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), Janet Opoku-Akyeampong (Mrs) has called for the creation of tax courts under our Judicial System to handle tax-related cases to ensure the resolution of tax disputes and also facilitate the recovery of taxes in a more professional way than the traditional law courts.

She said there are several recalcitrant taxpayers in the country who only understand the language of force, but under a democratic government, it is the rule of law that must prevail. Unfortunately, she continued, the traditional law courts have been saddled with several outstanding cases to be called upon to add the numerous tax cases.

Mrs. Opoku-Akyeampong made the call when she opened an IRS Management Seminar for the southern sector in Takoradi last Wednesday.

It was under the theme: "Strengthening Strategies for Enhanced Revenue Mobilisation."

The seminar was intended to give the IRS workers the opportunity to review the assessment and collection strategies that were adopted last year and also think about what should be done this year to ensure the realization of the ?2.062 billion being the revenue target for the Service this year.

According to the acting commissioner, besides the resolution of tax-related cases, time factor was also important and since the traditional courts are already saddled with a lot of cases, they might not have time and capacity to handle tax cases which are highly technical and specialized cases.

She disclosed that her outfit has already posted some lawyers to the Compliance Division in anticipation of the tax courts division being created to help expedite the resolution of tax disputes in the country. The Western Regional Minister, Mr. Boahen Aidoo, in a speech read on his behalf said his government pledged to ensure positive change that embraces all segments of society which also include the IRS.

Therefore, the Service must feel challenged to help the government fulfil its pledge to the people. According to him, the NPP government is confronted with a very unpleasant task of retrieving an enormous amount of debt inherited from the previous regime and that there is no way that tax could be undertaken without IRS playing a very active role especially with regard to the domestic debt.

The challenges loom even higher when we consider the very high expectations that people have for the new government, and those hopes again can only be fulfilled when the IRS together with sister agencies like CEPS and VAT Service rake in enough revenue to support the realization of those high expectations, he said. Boahen Aidoo further said the recent choice by the NPP-led government to join HIPC to get a little room to manoeuvre around the country's huge debt obligations clearly underlines the Service's economic circumstances of the country.

He was, however, hopeful that the revenue generating agencies can do a lot to help the country reduce its dependence on foreign loans and grants for survival and at the same time reduce the untenable level of domestic borrowing indulged in by the previous government, a situation which he noted, led to high interest rates and scarcity of credit for private sector operation.