BURS leakages aid tax evaders :: Mmegi Online

While the government has gone all out in a bid to increase tax collection by adjusting various taxes, sources suggest that it was not necessary, but rather there was need to reinforce systems and processes of the Botswana Unified Revenue Services (BURS).

It is said that a lot of foreign nationals owned businesses have used these gaps to master the art of tax evasion, sending out millions of Pula from the country on a daily basis.

“The problem starts at the borders with manipulation of the BURS system which is not intelligent enough to detect some obvious under valuing, for example. There are also officers there who allegedly connive with customs clearing agents. The problem of leakages is massive as BURS through Investigations, Compliance and Enforcement (ICE) Unit has since pounced on many businesses who failed to declare rightfully. These are mostly foreigners-owned operations. They have mastered the whole system and are declaring only a small amount of what they are due to pay as they ‘fake’ invoices,” a source said.

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