Improving tax collection

Letter January 24, 2020
FBR officials resisting implementation of taxes, not performing or caught in illegal acts should be quickly removed

PESHAWAR: The government is again facing difficulties in tax collection. They should understand that the FBR has never really collected taxes and would not know how to systematically start the tax collection process. The government should give the organisation small monthly targets to improve their performance.

For example, the FBR should only concentrate on the big cities in the first year. In the first 6 months, the FBR should target businesses like shopping plaza owners, rental buildings and homes.

In the second phase, they can target the retailers. These cases can be further divided into monthly targets. Although the general trend in the FBR is to start squeezing money out of the current taxpayers and companies, I think that should be avoided. In fact the government should make efforts to reduce or end taxes on salaries because in Riyasat-e-Madina salaries were not taxed as these are payments for individual efforts and hard work.

Furthermore, the FBR officials resisting implementation of taxes, not performing or caught in illegal acts should be quickly removed from employment under a new law. The organisation has been given many chances to improve but has continuously failed and made excuses. The success of our nation rests on their performance.

Engr Shahryar Khan Baseer

Published in The Express Tribune, January 24th, 2020.

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