Government introduces bill to scrap tax on lotto winning

Government has introduced a bill in parliament to remove taxes on lotto winnings in the country.

This follows proposals by the National Lottery Authority (NLA) to the Ministry of Finance for the scrapping of taxes paid by lotto agents as a way of attracting more mainstream operators.

The Mahama administration imposed a five percent tax on all lotto winnings exceeding GHS2,592, following a re-classification of lotto as an investment activity.

A Deputy Minister of Finance, Kwaku Kwarteng on Wednesday, 29 November 2017 laid the Value Added Tax (Amendment) (N0.2) Bill, 2017 on the floor of Parliament to remove the tax.

Apart from the lotto bill, other bills including the National Fiscal Stabilisation (Amendment) Bill, 2017, Special Import Levy (Amendment) (No.2) Bill, 2017 and Standard for Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information Bill, 2017 were also laid.