From Ghana Business News

Despite the Minority in Parliament staging a walkout to protest a 2.5 percent increment on the Value Added Tax (VAT), the House gave accent to the Value Added Tax (Amendment) Bill, upping the VAT rate from 12.5 percent to 15 percent.

The Minority expressed misgivings about the way the increment was “surreptitiously” introduced into a bill under consideration without debate on its cause and effects on the economy and the people.

As soon as a Deputy Finance Minister, Cassiel Ato Forson, rose to make an amendment seeking to impose a 2.5 percent increment on the VAT, the House was immediately thrown into chaos, as the minority vehemently protested the move, citing lack of consultation on the issue before bringing it to the floor of the House.

First Deputy Speaker, Ebo Barton Odro was at pains trying to control the temper tantrums that were thrown from both sides of the House. And the Minority walked out to register their displeasure at the lack of debate and discussion on the increment.

But Ato Forson explained to the House that since the VAT was a broad based tax, government, by the increment, will be able raise an additional yearly amount of GHc745 million  that would be devoted to capital development portion of the 2014 budget.

He said that from 2015, the amount to be accrued from the increment would be put into a national infrastructural development fund that would finance all investment projects like roads, schools, etc.

Read more at Ghana Business News