MPs approve taxes on mobile money, cooking oil

Parliament has passed the Excise Duty Amendment bill 20l8, imposing one percent (1%) tax on every mobile money transaction and 200 shillings on social media.

The tax measures approved by parliament are close to 1 trillion shillings and government argues that they will help in improving the tax base of the country.

The MPs stated that most of the tax proposed is specifically targeting a population that does not earn much in their business.

At first, the leader of opposition Winnie Kiiza had opposed the tax on mobile money saying it will affect areas without access to banks.

This was however opposed by MPs including James Kakooza (Kabula) , Abraham Byandala (Katikamu North), Amos Lugolobi (Ntejeru North) who said that government needs this tax to offer services and that the traditional means of transporting money are no longer in use which has made it hard for government to collect enough taxes.

Rubanda East mp Henry Musasizi said that using mobile money is a choice and hence it should be taxed just like other methods of payments which attract taxes.

Padyere MP Joshua Anywarach opposed taxes on social media but the minister of state for planning David Bahati noted that government is only going to be collecting 200 shillings daily, which he says is not very much, if government is to offer services.

The minister of state for planning David Bahati said that the transaction of mobile money stands at 60 trillion shillings compared to the country’s GDP of  100 trillion shillings where the mobile money transaction has not been taxed,

He stated that the people involved in the mobile money transaction should be taxed since they require health services, good roads, free education, and safe water among others.

The bill that was passed also saw parliament impose 200-shilling tax on every litre of cooking oil, 100 shillings on every litre of fuel, 200,000 shillings tax on every boda boda registered while confectioneries were exempted from tax.