RRA meets 50 percent target of gov’t budgetary support

Statistics show that the revenue body collection also aggressively increased from Rfw10.3b in 1998 to Rfw250b in 2007 in a bid to meet the huge budgetary demands. Rwanda Revenue Authority has met it’s 50 percent tax collection target of supporting the government’s budget demands, a government official has said. Gerald Nkusi, the Director of Taxpayers Services at RRA said that the revenue body has achieved this year’s targets after the deployment of an aggressive sensitization campaign across the country. Last year alone revenue collected could have supported 47 percent of the budget. Nkusi said that campaign also activated the culture of paying taxes amongst a largely unapprised population. He said that they were faced with educating the multitudes the significance of tax collection. Nkusi said this during last week’s RRA workshop to beginning of yet another series of sensitizations that are to start across the country. The aftermath of the 1994 Tutsi Genocide left the country largely depending on donor fund to steer the country’s development. During the recent development partners meeting hosted last week at eh Kigali Serena Hotel, it was reported that the country currently receives about $700m every year as official development assistance funds. Half of the government’s budget is also funded by donors with the British Department for International Development (DFID) donated the lion’s share. During the meeting Nkusi also added said that RRA is still faced challenges. “Out of 3300 tax payers, 1700 are not paying taxes. But there are others who intentionally don’t pay the taxes. Some change locality and also change their addresses with an intention of evading tax,” he said. George Byamukama Head of Decentralisation Support Unit in RRA, citing statistics from findings of a survey carried out this year, said that despite the rise in tax collection there were still set backs in the tax collection systems at each district to achieve their full potential. “During the survey we found out that 40 percent of expected taxes are not collected in some of the districts. In the Eastern province some districts don’t have the number of tax payers,” he said. Since the devastation infrastructure in pre-genocidal era Rwanda has gained economic pace that has seen the country being ranked as one of the fastest growing in Africa. Over the years her private sector has been developed thus increasing the revenue base. Currently, Rwanda’s annual growth rate is at 8 percent with a projection of 10 percent in the next one year. The increased economic pace and her continued aggressiveness towards development has also led to soaring budgetary demands by the government. This has pushed RRA to step up the tax collection efforts and meet high revenue collection targets. According to statistical details provided by RRA, when the revenue body was formed in 1995 the government budget was at Rfw6b but by 2007 it had shot to Rfw527b. The same statistics show that the revenue collection also aggressively increased from Rfw10.3b in 1998 to Rfw250b in 2007 in a bid to meet the huge budgetary demands. Apart from matching with the development pace, the other intention was to liberate the government budget from heavy dependence on aid. However, Andrew Bayingana, a local government officer among those that carried out the survey said that the district finance officer were overwhelmed. “There are usually two or three tax collectors, facilitation is poor, limited staff capacities, false declaration by taxpayers and legal challenges,” Bayingana said. Ends

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RRA meets 50 percent target of gov’t budgetary support