Duty on imported Spare parts Abolished – 2017 budget

President Akufo Addo has put measures in place to fulfill most of his campaign promises.

Prior to the 2016 Presidential and Parliamentary elections, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, who was then the running mate, promised that an NPP government would lessen and abolish the tax burden on head porters, popularly known as ‘Kayayei’, among others.

Apart from that some highlights of the Manifesto of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) as far as the economy is concerned are as follows:

– NPP will broaden the tax base with the formalisation of the economy

– NPP will abolish the taxes on kayayei placed on them by the NDC gov’t

– NPP will introduce tax benefits for organisations that hire fresh graduates

– NPP will abolish the 17.5% VAT on domestic airline tickets

– NPP will shift the focus from taxation to production by reducing corporate tax rate from 25% to 20%

Presenting the first budget statement of the Nana Addo-led administration, Thursday, Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta revealed that the tax burden on imported spare parts and ‘kayayei’ has been abolished.

This was mentioned as part of short and medium term measures that will be put in place by government.

Below are other tax cuts that were mentioned in the 2017 budget.

Abolishing of:

-1 % Special Import Levy
-Kayayei Market Tolls
-17.5 % VAT/NHIL on financial services,
-17.5 % VAT/NHIL on selected imported medicines, that are not produced locally,
-17.5 % VAT/NHIL on domestic airline tickets,
-5 % VAT/NHIL on Real Estate sales,
-Duty on imported Spare parts,
– Excise duty on petroleum
– Reduce special petroleum tax rate from 17.5% to 15%
– Replacement of 17.5% VAT/NHIL with 3 % flat rate for traders
– Replace 17% VAT tax on GSE traders with a flat rate of 3%
– Reduce national electrification levy