By Maimuna Sey Jawo
The Gambia Revenue Authority GRA on Thursday presented its 2020 annual activity and financial statement report before Finance and Public Accounts Committee (FPAC) of the National Assembly of The Gambia.
Lucy Fye -Jagne, GRA Board chairperson told the committee that one of the core mandates of GRA as a revenue collection agency is to assess, collect, and account for all revenue due to the government in a fair and transparent manner according to the revenue laws.
“Under our cultural setting, many see non- compliance towards tax obligation as normal. In such an environment the enforcement of revenue laws becomes a daily uphill battle and which in itself is both challenging and resourceful. We are therefore all appreciative of the magnitude of the task assigned to the Gambia Revenue Authority as the main GRA has been operating in a single revenue administration since 2007 and continues to account for most of the government, and recurrent budget, on an annual basis,” she said.
She said that the average annual revenue growth for the period 2007, to 2020, stood at 11%. This status of revenue mobilisation has given government greater leverage in driving its development projects and agenda. To further strengthen the gain in revenue mobilization and administration the GRA has continued to implement international best practices.
She added: “In the revenue administration as well as honour, regional and international protocols under Ecowas World customs organization, Africa Continental Free Trade Area, African Union, African tax administration forum ATAF and World Trade Organization such as trade facilitation agreement among others, we are pleased to state that GRA is currently with its audited financial statement. Upon consideration of the 2020 audited financial statement, GRA has no outstanding financial unaudited financial statement.2021 financial statement is not due yet, so we are filing complaints with the law.”
For his part, Yankuba Darboe, commissioner general of Gambia Ports Authority, said “we are here today on behalf of GRA management and staff to present the GRA 2020 annual activity report and financial statement to this August body. It is important to say that the finances statement we are presenting today is based on subvention perceived to run the affairs of the authority and not on the revenue collected for the government.”
According to him, the revenue collected by the authorities are being presented to this august body by the ministry of finance through the office of the accounting general as part of the overall government revenue and expenditure statement.
“As a semi autonomy autonomous body as mandated to administer the revenue loss of the Gambia by assisting in collecting and accounting for all revenue due for the government in a fair, transparent manner while providing efficient and effective systems for compliance. The establishment of the authority brought together the former department of central revenue, domestic taxes and customs and excise to enhance efficiency in administration and reduce the compliant border on taxpayers,” he said.
He said the oversight responsibility of managing the affairs of a GRA is providing the clear and consistent policy direction to the authority. The GRA board of directors meet once in every month and set up a staff and establishment and finance audit and audit subcommittee and to support it in discharging its function effectively and efficiently the day to running of the authority in reports on the commissioner general supported by the deputy commissioner, the year 2020 mark the beginning of the implementation of the authorities fourth corporate strategy plan 2020 to 2024
“Transforming business procedures and processes by leveraging ICT for improved efficiency and strengthening oversight mechanisms and monitoring and evaluation programs. The authority was quite optimistic and posed to consolidate gains in terms of revenue collection, register in the previous corporate strategy plan, unfortunately, the advent of the covid-19, which is one of the most destructive health emergencies in the world, has ever witnesses, whose challenges for GRA in terms of revenue collection, this is because the pandemic among others resulted in the closure of the borders, air space, downsizing of government operation, approved closure of the hotels and hospitalities, hospitality industry, ban in goods and services,” he added.
He said in 2020 despite the challenges posed by covid 19 the authority was able to meet it revenue target for 2020 overall, a total of D11.8 billion was collected by authority which exceeded the annual target by 10.8 billion by 17%, compare to the total revenue collected for the same period in 2019, 11.4 billion.
The director of finance and Accounting at GRA Saihou Denton who presented the 2020 financial report of GRA, said for them at GRA they spread the cost of the assets over the life of the period that they use them and, on that basis, they depreciate their assets.
Mariama Jack Denton, speaker of the parliament, said “we will do our homework together with our subject matter specialists and of course our aid that is the auditor general and his team and then we will communicate to you so that you can come forward, the ball is in the court of EPAC to work on it and continue with the engagement on the reports proper, and this is the consideration before a report is tabled before
She said today is the presentation of the Gambia revenue authority report, the document has already circulated but our standing orders and constitution require formally presented to FPAC will then do the proper consideration for the consultations and debate on the report court to follow afterwards.
