32 journalists trained in taxation, illicit financial flows

 Thirty-two financial and economic jour­nalists from the Greater Accra Region have been schooled on taxation, revenue mobilisation, combating Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs).

The two-day training workshop organised by Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) in collabo­ration with the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) and the Financial Intelligence Centre was to sharpen their skills to report accurately on the three areas.

Dubbed; ‘Progressive Taxation, Domestic Resource Mobilisation and Combating Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs) in Ghana,” the workshop formed part of MF­WA’s three-year project on Tax for Development: Strengthening Civil Society and Media for Fiscal Justice in Ghana, which is being funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Corporation through Oxfam in Ghana.

The participants were taken through topics such as public taxation, the IFFs legal regulatory framework, trends and challenges and how IFFs undermine do­mestic revenue mobilisation and fact-checking of stories.

Opening the workshop, the Assistant Commissioner and Head of Communications at the GRA, Mrs Florence Asante, said the taxes were means to raise revenue for the development of the country.

She said the mandate of the GRA was to enforce the tax laws and raise revenue for the country.

Mrs Asante said countries were built through taxes and it was important for the GRA to raise enough financial resources to help government execute its develop­ment projects.

“We need to build a country on taxes collected so we do not go to borrow to finance development projects in the country,” she stated.

The Assistant Commissioner and Head of Communications urged the media to intensify educa­tion on tax issues and support the Authority to execute its mandate, saying “you have a good role to play,” in promoting tax collection and compliance.

The Director of Research of the MFWA, Kojo Impraim in his remarks said the Tax for Develop­ment: Strengthening Civil Society and Media for Fiscal Justice in Ghana was also being implement­ed in Kenya Uganda.

He said the objective of the pro­gramme was to build the capacity of the financial journalists to tell impactful and human interest sto­ries on taxation, revenue mobilisa­tion and IFFs.

Dr Impraim said Ghana had ca­pacity to mobilise enough resourc­es to finance the budget and other development projects if revenue leakages were blocked.

He said IFFs impacted progres­sive taxation and revenue mobili­sation agenda of government, and the current crisis the country was going through could be reversed if IFFs were nipped in the bud.

“In our estimation, IFFs in­volves over and under invoicing, and happening in money laun­dering and party financing,” Dr Impraim said.

The Communications Coordina­tor of Oxfam in Ghana, Archibald Adams, said his outfit was an influ­encing organisation with the aim to address the poverty in the world.

He said it was in that direction that his outfit was partnering MFWA to implement the pro­gramme

 BY KINGSLEY ASARE