The opposition New Patriotic Party is accusing the government of worsening the plight of Ghanaians with its stringent tax policy regimes. This according to the Head of Communications Kweku Kwarteng was not what the party promised Ghanaians in the 2008 general elections.
�The NDC government is a victim of its own promises. They did promise in their campaign manifesto that in the first 100 days they would carry out a comprehensive reduction of levies and tariffs so Ghanaians will have reliefs.
�In the last one year we saw a marginal reduction in petroleum taxes. There are signals in the 2010 budget that that will be reversed and now we are seeing an increase of all forms of levies and tariffs. It shows clearly that the government hasn�t been very sincere with the people of Ghana,� he told Joy News in an interview on Thursday. He noted there are no guarantees that the revenue generated from these levies will be channeled into productive ventures. Even more unfortunate he said is government�s tendency to overspend, not on capital ventures, but purely on administration and services.
Quoting figures from this year�s budget, Mr Kwarteng said government overspent nearly 40 per cent of its administrative budget. �For administration and services we are talking about refreshment and tea and kebab people enjoy at meetings and committee work,� he said.
Whilst the administrative budget was sky rocketing, he said wages went down by six per cent. This he stressed did not portray the better Ghana agenda the NDC promised. Kweku Kwarteng cautioned government to build confidence in the Ghanaians with the believe that the monies it collects in taxes will be spent on the right things.
Asked if the communication tax imposed under the NPP government be withdrawn to free Ghanaians from the strangling tax regimes, Mr. Kwarteng said if the revenue accrued will be wrongfully expended then the tax ought to be scrapped.
But Communication Minister Haruna Iddrisu disagrees. He explained that �government will not deliberately inflict hardships on its citizenship.� He said government had to increase road tolls largely to raise revenue to execute the better Ghana agenda for the country.
According to him, the then Kufuor-led administration to which Kweku Kwarteng belongs, took a loan of $84 million from SSNIT which government had to pay through funds generated from the road funds. He explained government�s decision to impose taxes on akpeteshie (local gin) and cigarettes was to discourage its usage because they were injurious to the human body.
He also dismissed claims of high administrative budget, insisting the NDC has a relatively lower expenditure as compared to the first year of the NPP administration.
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