Accountants urge extension of tax relief

PHILLEPUS UUSIKU

The Namibia Institute of Professional Accountants (NIPA) has appealed to finance minister Iipumbu Shiimi and NamRa commissioner Sam Shivute to extend the tax relief period by at least 12 months more.

In an 11-page letter to Shiimi and Shivute, NIPA CEO Esther Herbst and president Bruné Pretorius asked for the extension “to assist taxpayers and officials to correct, update and pay the correct debts to the state”.

The extension will also allow the Namibia Revenue Agency (NamRA) “to fully implement their systems, appointments and strategies to be more user friendly, approachable and service orientated and on par with other similar agencies in other countries”, NIPA said.

NIPA cited several issues with the Integrated Tax Administration System (ITAS) which needs to be resolved to ensure the effective payment of taxes.

According to NIPA, the establishment of NamRa brought about changes and challenges that not only affected the offices and officials of both the Ministry of Finance and NamRa, but it also affected the taxpayers.

NamRa inherited many challenges and unresolved issues of the past. “We believe that the new ITAS system is currently the biggest challenge faced by NamRa, officials and the taxpayers alike.”

It would only be fair to state that NamRa is granted sufficient time to establish itself within the tax framework and to win the trust of all taxpayers. At present we find that taxpayers do not trust our tax administrative system and engage daily with unprofessional conduct of officials, NIPA pointed out.

In addition, even though the agency has made strides in educating the nation regarding tax affairs, NIPA highlighted that is important to note that many taxpayers do not have the capacity to understand tax laws and their obligations and duties towards the tax system.

A broader approach needs to be adopted to assist and give guidance to taxpayers, especially those who do not engage professionals.

Covid-19

Moreover, the state of emergency imposed in March 2020 forced businesses and taxpayers to remain home during the lockdown and subsequently tight restrictions on movement.

Hence, this has led to many people not able to gain access to their company records as they were required to work in one way or another from home. Revenue was lost, jobs were lost, daily administration tasks created back logs, normal daily business operations were simply turned upside down.

Therefore, the impact the state of emergency on a small nation like Namibia, one would argue that the impact of Covid-19 alone should be reasonable grounds to extend the tax relief program by itself.

Equally, tax administrators were not been able to attend to their work as they would normally do, impacting the service they can deliver to the taxpayers, which, more often than not, is needed to partake in the tax relief program successfully.

“The devastation of this impact is only becoming clear now that we have returned to some way of ‘normal’ life again and picking up the pieces left behind,” NIPA [email protected]