By Maimuna Sey-Jawo
Stakeholders from The Gambia Revenue Authority (GRA) Monday started a two-day online forum to discuss the Gambia Revised Kyoto Accession (RKC).
The forum funded by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) aimed at exposing participants to the designing roadmap for the completion of the accession process.
In his official opening remarks, Yankuba Darboe, Commissioner General of the Gambia Revenue Authority (GRA), stressed on the purpose of organizing the online forum.
He said the forum was meant to take stock of the progress that has been made in their bid to complete The Gambia’s accession to the Revised Kyoto Convention as well as designing the roadmap for the completion of the accession process.
“As you may be aware, The Gambia ratified the Kyoto Convention in 1974, almost a year of its coming into force. However, since the entry into force of the Revised Kyoto Convention (RKC) in 2006, The Gambia remains one of the few countries yet to ratify the Convention despite the numerous benefits that can be derived from ratifying the Convention” CG said.
According to CG Darboe, the management of the Gambia Revenue Authority is determined to end this undesirable state of affair. In a bid to speed up the accession process, the management of GRA setup a steering committee in 2019 to kick start the accession process.
After the inauguration of the Committee, he said the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world and this took its toll on the timeline for achieving this objective. Since its setting up, the RKC Committee has engaged the relevant stakeholders in the process and together designed a roadmap for the process.
However, the Commissioner General implored participants not to relent until the submission of the instrument of ratification to the WCO in the shortest possible time. Even though the pandemic was determined to stall this process, but this online forum should be a manifestation of your resolve to get this assignment done.
“Acceding to the RKC brings enormous benefit to The Gambia. As the foremost WCO convention on the simplification and harmonisation of Customs procedures, it will no doubt improve and enhance trade facilitation; provide international trade with predictability and efficiency that it requires and it will lay a solid foundation for reforming and strengthening our Customs legislations and standardising them with WCO best practice” he stated further.
The Commissioner General on behalf of the Board and Management of the GRA therefore expressed profound gratitude for the support they have received from the WCO since they notified them of their desire to accede to the Convention. “I will also wish to thank the sponsors of this workshop, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), for providing the funding for this workshop,” CG GRA thanked the sponsors.
In an extension, thanked and commended the RKC committee and the various stakeholders for the hard work exhibited while he urged them to keep up the hard work throughout the completion of the assignment.