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The Ghana Revenue Authority Special Revenue Mobilisation Task Force yesterday closed down 50 mobile phone shops operating at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle, in Accra, for not honouring their tax obligations to the state.

The team also arrested the managers of two printing companies at Kokomlemle and Adabraka, and later handed them over to the police for evading taxes and generating their own tax clearance certificates.

Those arrested were Mr Eugine Yabi, the Managing Director of Yemens Printing and Packaging Limited, and the Assistant Managing Director of Skyco Printing Press Limited, Mr Eric Yeboah.

The premises of another printing press, Mork Impressions, at Mamprobi were also sealed off for allegedly reducing its tax declaration between 2013 and 2016 to the tune of GH¢441,101.80.

Mobile phone dealers 

The exercise at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle brought trading activities to a halt in the area as the task force sealed mobile phone shops with their special yellow tapes and padlocks.

However, some of the shop owners locked up their shops and disappeared before the task force could get to their shops.

The team of tax administrators led by Chief Revenue Officer, Mr Theophilus Gaskin, found out that most of the shops were either not registered with the Ghana Revenue Authority or were not issuing Value Added Tax (VAT) invoices at all.

Some of the shops which were closed included Franko phones, Nana Apraku Enterprise, Gyasi and Brothers phones, Ricamp Phones, Planet Telecom, Mobile Forest Phones and M-horse Mobile Phones.

Protest 

While some of the operators rained insults on the task force, others protested when the team attempted to lock up their shops.

The Chairman of the Mobile Phone Dealers Association, Mr Osei Agyeman, who expressed displeasure at the manner the exercise was carried out, also complained that the traders were not given enough notice.

He threatened to mobilise the members of the association “to protect their shops and human rights. We saw a publication in the newspapers reminding mobile phone dealers to honour their tax obligations by today. We should have been given some grace period to get our act together and comply with the law.” 

Objective 

Speaking to journalists later, Mr Gaskin explained that the exercise was not to collapse the businesses but to expose recalcitrant taxpayers who had over the years refused to adhere to the laws. 

He said the task force had found out that some business were issuing forged tax invoices and receipts, while some had altered the serial numbers on the tax invoices and others had also generated their own tax documents.

“Tax documents are statutory documents which are supposed to emanate only from the GRA,” he said. 

The task force which was constituted on August 3, 2015, he said, collected GH¢138.827 million by the end of the year through on-the-spot collections during special exercises carried out by the members. 

Mr Gaskin said a recent seven-week campaign on rent income tax payment had yielded GH¢4.279 million.

Additionally he said the task force had gathered information that some local contractors who had undertaken projects for the state were evading taxes saying that “through third party sources, the task force has collected GH¢414.4 million from some persons who have provided goods and services to some ministries, departments and agencies”.