Vehicle and Assets Dealers Association of Ghana are scheduled to hit the streets this month in protest against the levy imposed on luxury vehicles.
Speaking to Journalists, after a meeting with the Trade Minister, Alan Kyeremanteng on the issue, President of the Association, Eric Kweku Boateng justified the need for the demonstration.
“The reason why we want to demonstrate again is that the trade minister and government are not ready to listen to us. Since they come in place of the luxury vehicle tax, our business has virtually collapsed. We can’t sit back and watch this happen. We will mount these protests in June,” he said.
The move by the Association follows an earlier one in March where members of the Association drove their vehicles in a convoy through some principal streets of Accra, protesting the levy which was introduced by the government in August 2018 specifically for vehicles with engine capacity of 3.0 litres and above.
The government introduced the vehicle luxury tax in August 2018 as a new policy to help raise more revenue.
To this end, vehicles with engine capacity of 2950 to 3549 Cubic Centimetres are required to pay GH¢1,000, while those with engines between 3,550 to 4049 cubic centimetres pay GH¢1,500. Vehicles with engine capacities above 4049cc are to pay GH¢2,000.
Meanwhile, the government has collected some GH¢21.3 million in taxes from the use of vehicles with engine capacities of 2.9 litres and above between August and December last year, provisional fiscal data on public finances for last year has shown.
The amount is GH¢82.7 million or 79.52 per cent below the GH¢104million that was projected to be collected within the period. The projections were contained in the 2018 mid-year budget review.
The government expects to rake in at least 300 million cedis from the tax on luxury vehicles by the end of 2019.
