The Chartered Institute of Taxation Ghana (CITG) has inducted 72 newly chartered tax practitioners, including 10 females, into its membership.
At the event held last Saturday, the institute also graduated 83 others; 70 males and 13 females.
A High Court judge, Justice Olivia Obeng Owusu, inducted the new chartered tax practitioners into the institute.
The inductees received certificates upon their graduation.
Digital economy
Addressing the event, the Minister of Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum, called on tax practitioners to help to scale up the education of Ghanaians on the need to honour their tax obligations.
That, he said, was to enable the state to generate the needed revenue for development.
I urge you all to employ the knowledge you gained in your professional tax journey so far to help taxpayers to be tax compliant, while supporting the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) and the state to achieve improved and sustainable revenue to support our collective socio-economic development.
“In addition, ensure that you support to reach out to all in terms of tax education that does not only inspire the study of taxation, but also sustainable voluntary tax compliance among Ghanaian taxpayers,” he said at the ceremony, dubbed: “Taxing the Digitised Economy — The Role of the Charted Tax Practitioners”.
Dr. Adutwum noted that with the world transitioning to a digital economy, and with digitalisation at the forefront of the government’s transformation agenda, “we need to intensify partnerships to step up efforts in offering digital skills training and capacity building for human talent across various sectors of the Ghanaian economy”.
The ministry, he said, was committed to such mandate, and expressed the hope that with support from other government agencies and stakeholders such as the CITG, there would be much progress.
Progress
The Commissioner of Support Services of the GRA, Julie Essiam, said the country’s digitisation agenda was progressing smoothly, stressing that several strides had been made in that direction, and that government agencies, including the GRA, had been tasked with the digital transformation of their respective agencies.
“In that regard, the GRA has embarked on a number of policy initiatives being rolled out to improve on our processes and procedures to facilitate our revenue mobilisation,” she said.
The Chairman of the Governing Council of the CITG, Emmanuel Obeng Asiedu, said the graduands and practitioners were graduating and being admitted at a time when the world was dealing with enormous challenges, and at a time the opportunities created by those challenges had never been greater.
The President of the CITG, George Ohene Kwatia, said there was the need for an increased collaboration between the institute and the GRA.
That, he said, was not from an antagonistic position, but to serve as business adviser to the GRA where objectivity would be the key.