Neck-breaking Taxes Greet Ghanaians Momo, DSTV next after Catastrophic CST

The tax-hungry Ministry of Communications has hinted that millions of Mobile Money (MoMo) users would soon be saddled with taxes on their transactions on the mobile-based payment platform. Communications Minister Ursula Owusu-Ekuful gave this hint a few days ago on an interview on Accra-based Asempa FM.

She said the ministry was already in talks with telecommunication companies in the country to pave way taxes to be imposed on MoMo transactions. “Mobile Money taxation is on our radar and we are monitoring and very soon you’ll hear of us in no time but as it stands it’s not been taxed,” Mrs Owusu-Ekuful stated.The proposed tax will be in spite of the fact that users are already angry at transaction costs charged them by mobile telephone service providers for cash transactions on MoMo. The proposed MoMo tax would also be coming despite mobile service consumers reeling under a 9 % Communication Service Tax (CST) slapped on them a few weeks ago. Already, the Akufo Addo administration is receiving bad rap from millions of mobile phones users when the service providers decided to pass on the CST to them wholesale. The CST does not spare cable television networks, as DSTV announced an upward adjustment of its monthly subscription to accommodate the extra taxes. Barely two months ago, had prices of petroleum products shot up because the Akufo Addo administration in its mid-year budget review imposed additional taxes on petroleum products-as much as 20%, forcing private and public transport companies to pass on the extra costs to consumers. The Chamber of Petroleum Consumers recently chided the Akufo Addo administration for its insensitivity to Ghanaians with its appetite to impose more taxes on them. “contrary to public expectation of a downward review of the crippling taxes on the petroleum price build-up has rather through the 2019 midyear budget review increased the already choking levels of fuel taxes leading to this current increases Ghanaians are seeing at the pumps now,” a recent statement issued by the Chamber read. Critics have called out the Akufo Ado administration for deception because it loudly promised to cut tax burdens on Ghanaians before it was elected into power in 2016. Indeed, now Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia in his famous criticism of the previous administration of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) described the increase of taxation as a lazy approach to revenue mobilisation.