Public Angry Over VAT Increase

... Massive Demo Planned

Public anger over the proposed incease of the VAT rate from 12?% to 15% is mounting.

The increase is one of the IMF conditionalities that the Government agreed to implement by September 2003 in return for loans totalling about US$230 million for budgetary support.

Tension, GHANA PALAVER said, is mounting in the country over the issue as the majority of Ghanaians now realize that President Kufuor has tricked them and that the National Health Insurance Bill is only a smokescreen for an increase in the VAT rate.

Some workers the paper spoke to were very angry with the TUC leadership of doing a deal with the Government by refusing to speak openly against the hidden 2?% SSNIT deductions, bad though, that also is.

Already, GHANA PALAVER has learnt of plans for massive demonstration to be staged in Accra, Takoradi, Tema, Kumasi, Obuasi and Tarkwa in opposition to the VAT rate increase because of its destablishing effects on the already worsening economy and the diminishing purchasing power of income earners.