Professor Stephen Adei Mensah has urged politicians to be realistic about tax policies, cautioning that campaign promises to remove certain taxes often lead to more complicated levies once in office.
He argued that scrapping taxes without a proper plan forces governments to introduce even more complex taxation methods.
“There’s a need for much more rationalization than the politically correct approach of simply scrapping taxes,” he stated.
Referring to past administrations, he highlighted how tax policies often change once leaders assume office.
“You cited what the former president said and didn’t do. What will happen is that they may remove one tax and then have to find other sources. That’s how the multiplication of taxes came about.
“They immediately canceled one levy, and later found out that they needed the money, so they introduced far more complicated ones,” he explained.
According to him, governance requires pragmatic decision-making, which often contradicts political promises.
“It is one thing making a political statement and another thing ruling the country,” he emphasized.
Reacting to recent promises to scrap the E-Levy and betting taxes, he stated that such commitments will require alternative revenue measures, which could end up being more burdensome.
“The way President Mahama put it, he has no choice but to scrap the E-Levy and betting taxes and find another way of replacing them. And I think that any other way will be more complicated than the E-Levy,” he remarked.
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