A scam in which some importers and local manufacturing companies of cooking oil are perpetuating pilferage and evasion of tax thereby making government lose out on millions of Kwachas has been unearthed.
According to credible sources, some companies are cheating the state by selling their products without invoices and in cash thereby denying the state the rightful share of VAT revenues. Some are even wrongfully declaring goods for exports and selling them in domestic market thereby cheating the state again of right full tax revenues. As a result, 16% VAT tax revenue is all lost and government coffers remain bleeding as the monies go into individual pockets and the named companies.
The sources have revealed that the named cooking oil companies are conniving with some officials within the Zambia Revenue Authority who are fully aware of the scourge but are silent because they benefiting from these dubious transactions. This is happening at a time when the New Dawn government is trying hard to seal all revenue leakage loopholes in an effort to rebuild the economy which was broken down as a result of rampant corruption and tax evasion.
It has been further established that besides cooking oil, other companies are engaged in a similar syndicate with sectors most affected by this pilferage involving consumer products such as soaps, drinks, food products etc.
Sources have advised that if government does not intervene to halt this pilferage, the Zambia Revenue Authority coffers will continue to overflow with leakages thereby straining the country’s fiscal space and trigger further upward price adjustments on basic commodities.
