38 SRA EMPLOYEES FIRED

MBABANE – A total of 38 Eswatini Revenue Authority (SRA) employees have been fired for integrity and tax corruption-related issues.

The figure was revealed yesterday by the SRA Commissioner General (CG), Dumisani Masilela, during a press conference held at the organisation’s headquarters. He said the employees have been dismissed since 2011.
Presently, he said seven more of their employees were allegedly implicated in tax corruption-related matters. He mentioned that internal investigations were still ongoing.

The CG confirmed that jointly, through their systems and whistle-blowers, they had uncovered anomalies related to corruption perpetrated allegedly by some of their officers in conjunction with about 12 taxpayers.

The confirmed amount involved, according to the SRA boss, was so far below the recently reported E2 million. However, he stated that this figure was inconclusive as they continued to uncover the alleged malpractices. He mentioned that they were working in collaboration with the Royal Eswatini Police Service in their investigations, which could either culminate in a further drop or increase of the amount.  

   
He said as internal investigations unfold, all those involved in the fraudulent activities would be dealt with in accordance with the relevant laws and policies.

Colluded

 Masilela said preliminary investigations revealed that some employees allegedly colluded with taxpayers to delay collection of revenue by assisting them circumvent some of their processes such as the issuance of Tax Compliance Certificates.

He said defaulting taxpayers were not entitled to the certificate. Masilela mentioned that most of the cases were manipulation of pre-payments at border gates.
The CG pointed out that the taxpayers who allegedly colluded with the implicated employees had only exacerbated their tax arrears.

 “They have only served to postpone payment while their accounts continued to accumulate significant amounts of interest on the tax debts which must still be paid,” said Masilela.

Masilela further cautioned taxpayers that SRA had put in place strong processes and systems that did not allow individual officers to either reduce or eliminate a taxpayer’s debt.

“Any suggestion by an officer that they can deliver that is a gross misrepresentation of the facts and can only result in further losses to the taxpayer as they will pay the officer and yet still have to contend with the outstanding tax debt at some point,” he said. Masilela appealed to taxpayers to desist from colluding with the few delinquent members of staff in this manner.  He said as an organisation, when they took over the responsibility to collect revenue for government, they made a commitment to restore the integrity of revenue admission in the country and re-establish public trust in the institution.

Masilela said it was for this reason that they committed to a full investigation of any member of staff involved in such activities and ensuring that anyone found guilty of such an offence was dealt with comprehensively.
It should be mentioned that the country’s tax debt stood at E4.54 billion in the 2018/19 fiscal year.

This was a result of non-payment of liabilities from returns submitted for various tax types including income taxes, Pay-As-You-Earn (PAYE) and Valued Added Tax (VAT). These figures were disclosed by Prime Minister Ambrose Mandvulo Dlamini during his recent public filing of income tax returns at the Cabinet Offices. The PM’s filing was in compliance with the Kingdom of Eswatini’s Income Tax Order of 1975 as amended.

Tax

Dlamini said the tax debt increased by approximately 31 per cent to E4.54 billion from E3.46 billion in 2017/18.
The head of government filed his tax returns through the online e-Tax tool which was launched in 2015 by SRA. Filing one’s income tax return is a way to inform SRA about the income one has earned.

Meanwhile, e-Tax is an electronic platform which allows one to manage their taxes online. With this service, people are able to view account information, file their returns, view statements, view overdue and upcoming returns and payments, access tools to make filing their tax easier and submit enquiries without having to queue at SRA offices.

Dlamini said the rate at which the country’s tax debt increased was a cause for serious concern. He implored SRA to embark on a campaign to ensure that the tax debt was substantially reduced in line with its domestic resource mobilisation plan.

SRA is a semi- autonomous revenue administration agency responsible for revenue and customs administration on behalf of the Government of the Kingdom of Eswatini. The authority acts within the broad framework of government but outside of the civil service structures. SRA was founded through the Revenue Authority Act No. 1 of 2008 and was duly declared operational on January 1, 2011.

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