Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) has today issued a statement barring all tax defaulters from travelling outside the country until they clear their tax liabilities.
Following the release of the Shame List early this month, consisting 178 names of its clients, URA gave the defaulters only seven days to clear up their tax liabilities but only 10 managed to respond to the deadline.
“Of the 178 clients, only 10 have since responded since the deadline period expired last Friday,” said Mr Allan Ssempebwa Kyobe, the Media Officer, Public and Corporate Affairs, at URA..
To fully enforce on clients to clear the debt, URA has already taken measures into effect including issuing travel bans, closing down the business premises among others.
Mr Ssempebwa says they have been prompted to do so because efforts to get the tax defaulters to “clear up their outstanding liability have turned fruitless”.
URA under the existing Tax Laws is mandated to request Immigrations to bar any person from travelling out of the country before he or she fully pays the outstanding tax in full or provides a financial bond guaranteeing payment of the tax due or makes payment of tax in full (VAT Act, Cap 349, Section 34 (5) (a) and (b).
(2) Closure of business premises.
(3) Attachment of defaulter’s assets.
(4) Prosecution of some tax payers for issuing bounced cheques.
According to the URA Debt Collection Manager, Abudu Salaam Waiswa, the notice has received little consideration unlike in the previous shame lists published.
“We have so far registered decimal response from defaulters. Even the few that have responded have not made substantial payments,” he stated.
Meanwhile, some of URA clients that have so far faced this full enforcement include; Askar Security located on Entebbe road for Shs100m, New Kamwokya Gapco Ltd (Shs 110m), Akright Projects Ltd (Shs 659m) and Marketing Information system Ltd Shs 289m).
Waiswa also said they will confiscate some cars of the clients who have failed to clear the debts.
“We also intend to attach cars owned by Kampala big car owners, like SK MBUGA,” Salaam added.
He has urged all of other taxpayers to comply before we enforce against them.
