Giant strides in revenue mobilization:

DG of Taxation, Modeste Fatoing

delivering the goods

Taxation department generates FCFA 1300bn in 9 months 

The disclosure was made after the monthly coordination meeting of central and external services of the Directorate General of Taxation that held in Ebolowa recently

By Tanyi Kenneth Musa in Yaounde

The tax sector in Cameroon is growing from strength to strength. A press release from the Ministry of Finance (MINFI) has revealed to The Median that the balance sheet of the mobilization of tax revenue for the first nine months of 2015, presented recently by the Directorate General of Taxation (DGT), is overly positive.

                At the monthly coordination meeting of the central and external services of the DGT that held in Ebolowa on 16 October 2015, it emerged that within this period the DGT mobilized over 1.300 billion FCFA out of the earmarked 1.640 billion FCFA.

                “This is an impressive realization,” the release, issued after the coordination meeting and signed by the Director General of Taxation, MopaFatoing, said.

                It added: “It is at the end of the last three months of the year that we will be able to know the total amount realized by the DGT for the year 2015. But from the look of things, the Directorate will certainly exceed its objectives and impressively so.”

                Commenting on the wonderful performance, a senior tax inspector working for MINFI said he was very upbeat especially as the DGT was able to realize up to 110 billion FCFA for the month of September 2015 alone, even though the earmarked amount was 100 billion FCFA.

                The Median was also informed that as at the time of the meeting, the South region as well as other regional centres had mobilized amounts which surpassed their objectives. The South region was said to have come up with 3.3 billion FCFA, but it was not clear to us how much its earmarked amount was.   

                The reasons for the excellent performance in the first three quarters of the year, as disclosed by the release, are many and varied. First, it is thanks to extensive reforms carried out by the team of the DGT with the support and directives of the hierarchy. The others are the innovations of the 2015 Finance Law, the cleaning up of the taxpayers’ index, the putting in place of seven medium-sized tax offices, the strengthening of the DGT’s capacity and finally the change of procedures for the payment of taxes with more determination.

                It should be noted that the performance objective of the fourth quarter of 2015 as per this year’s Finance Law is 415 billion FCFA. The DGT has put in place some strategies to realize this objective. These include the consolidation of the reforms of broadening and securing the tax base while continuing with the cleaning of the taxpayers’ index as well as reinforcing the respect enshrined in the 2015 Finance Law, particularly the reform of Excise Duties and the raising of the rate of installment on income tax.  Other strategies are the strengthening of measures for the collection of tax arrears and the reinforcement of the control of Value Added Tax in collaboration with the customs administration.

                Besides presenting a balance sheet of the mobilization of tax revenue for the first nine months of 2015 and of the month of September, the DGT also evaluated the implementation of the 2015 Action Plan, at the Ebolowa meeting.