TANZANIA REVENUE AUTHORITY TAX COLLECTION SOARS

TRA Director of Taxpayers’ Education, Mr Richard Kayombo.

Revenue collection soared in the second half of last year to 7.27 trillion/-, up from 6.44 trillion/- in the corresponding period of the previous year.

Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) Director of Taxpayers’ Education, Mr Richard Kayombo, told reporters in Dar es Salaam on Tuesday that the increase was equivalent to 12.74 per cent.

He said December posted a record high collection of 1.414 tri/-.

“The increase in tax collection has been achieved through effective collection, emphasis on diligence, improvement of payment systems and covering of all corruption loopholes The boost was also precipitated by a mixture of factors such as mineral exploitation, manufacturing and general trade, which had fluctuated from time to time,” said Mr Kayombo.

He said the authority and security organs have added momentum in the monitoring of all smuggled goods that entered the country.

“Several crackdowns have been conducted to check and arrest people responsible for the vice and confiscate all the goods that have been coming into the country illegally to check loss of government revenue,” the TRA official said.

Mr Kayombo also said that it is for the purpose of ensuring maximum revenue collection that TRA has encouraged the use of Electronic Fiscal Device (EFD) machines and payments of property tax.

“TRA continues all traders registered with the Value Added Tax (VAT) to submit their monthly returns before every 20th of the month as revised in the Finance Law of 2016.

Commenting on measures taken to ensure adequate collection of taxes at food joints that issue normal receipts to passengers, especially during the festive seasons when many people are travelling, Mr Kayombo said TRA has been monitoring such places to ensure they issue EFD receipts.

“The campaign to ensure that customers are issued with EFD receipts is ongoing to ensure the government gets all due revenue.

President John Magufuli had recently issued a directive to regional commissioners (RCs) and Local Government Authorities (LGAs) to allocate areas where small traders could conveniently operate.

“We are still waiting for necessary instructions to implement the directive so that we could execute proper tax collectionmeasures,’’ Mr Kayombo explained.

He, however, reminded all those who have not verified their TIN numbers to do immediately to beat the January 31 deadline. Mr Kayombo pointed out that upon expiration of the deadline, no time will be extended to allow the exercise to move in the regions.

The TRA official also urged traders with outstanding tax debts to report to districts and regional TRA managers to discuss modes of payment that would not affect their businesses.

Buildings’ owners have also been reminded on the importance of ‘’willingly paying’’ their property taxes to avoid legal action.

Daily News