Private Sector Federation solicits views of MSEs on tax reforms

The Private Sector Federation (PEF) is embarking on a nationwide consultation with Medium and Small-Scale Enterprises (MSEs) to solicit their views on tax reforms and the impact on their businesses.

The move is to expose them to the tax laws, their obligations under the law and collate their views and challenges to form the basis to push for a favourable tax regime for the sector.

Four zonal consultative workshops are consequently being held for MSEs across the 10 regions by the PEF, with support from the Open Society Initiative for West Africa.

Fifty participants from the Ashanti and Brong Ahafo regions have attended the middle belt edition in Kumasi.

Nana Osei Bonsu, the Chief Executive Officer of PEF, said every business had the responsibility to pay tax but the burden on MSEs could be detrimental to their survival if implemented across all sectors flatly.

He explained that 25 per cent of tax liability on a small business was not the same as a huge conglomerate and there was, therefore, the need to design tax policies to suit various categories of businesses.

He said it was also important to review the current system to make it friendlier to MSEs as that would ensure voluntary compliance.

The workshop, he noted, formed part of PEF’s commitment to encourage MSEs to pay taxes to the State by collating the concerns of participants for onward submission to policy makers for consideration.

He said all concerns to be raised would form the basis to dialogue with government for a tax system that would ensure businesses paid commensurate taxes in line with their incomes.

He indicated that the MSEs were already grappling with numerous challenges such as high cost of doing business and high interest rates on loans and called for flexible tax systems to enable them grow their businesses.