3 Foreigners arrested for falsifying VAT invoices

Three foreigners, including the manager of Dada Foods, a fruit juice manufacturing company in Accra, have been arrested at Kpone in the Greater Accra Region for allegedly falsifying Value Added Tax (VAT) invoices and evading taxes.

The General Manager of Dada Foods, Wang Zhong Guo, the Operations Manager, Yuh Quig Yuh, and a salesgirl, Rose Chen, were arrested in a special exercise undertaken by the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA).

The operations manager is also said to bear the name Xie Xia, although their passports have not yet been retrieved to ascertain their true identities.

The arrest follows an intelligence picked up by the Counter Intelligence Unit at the Office of the President.

Duplicate VAT invoices

Briefing journalists at the Customs Laboratory in Accra yesterday ahead of a visit to the premises of Dada Foods at Kpone, near Tema, in the Greater Accra Region, the Head of the Special Revenue Mobilisation Tax Force of the GRA, Mr Henry Sam, said the visit by the joint team of members of the GRA Task Force and military was aimed at retrieving all VAT invoices in the possession of the company to ascertain the total amount the state had been deprived of.

He said after intelligence was gathered, the team, in collaboration with the police, last Saturday intercepted and impounded two vehicles belonging to Dada Foods and loaded with fruit juice produced by the company on the Accra-Tema motorway.

The team found that Dada Foods issued to its customers original VAT invoices that were different from the duplicate submitted to the GRA.

Copies of the original and duplicate VAT invoices were shown to the media. On one of them, the VAT invoice issued to a customer had the amount GH¢11,000, while the duplicate which was submitted to the GRA had GH¢1,100.

"When submitting duplicate copies to the GRA, the VAT invoices carried lower values," Mr Sam explained.

Dada Foods produces New Star Drink, Dada Fruit Drink and Dada Delicious Juice Drink.

Charges

According to Mr Sam, the manager of the company and his accomplices would be charged for suppression of sales, tax evasion and making false and misleading statements to the state.

Subsequently, he said, the GRA would undertake a comprehensive tax audit that would comprise a reassessment of the company including retrieving all invoices issued to it to re-check the various amounts indicated and submitted to the authority.

Mr Sam said when the tax audit was completed, any shortfall in taxes would attract a 100 per cent penalty pursuant to Sections 74 and 81 of the Revenue Administration Act, 2016 (Act 915).

"We are also going to prosecute them and charge them for the various offences,'' he said.

The GRA/military and police joint task force has since stormed the premises of Dada Foods at Kpone to retrieve VAT invoices.

Revenue mobilisation

The acting Commissioner-General of the GRA, Mr Ammishaddai Owusu-Amoah, said as part of efforts to meet the GRA’s full-year revenue target, it was embarking on a revenue mobilisation campaign aimed at collecting all outstanding debts owed the GRA.

“We are also aiming at compliance, especially with regard to the VAT since many traders and manufacturers do not properly account for the tax. We are also aiming at achieving general compliance as a means to getting many more people who are not in the tax net to register and get their Tax Identification Numbers (TIN),” Mr Amoah said.

When he was asked if the GRA would be capable of meeting its revenue target for 2019, Mr Amoah revealed that as of the end of September this year, the GRA had collected GH¢32 billion as against a target of GH¢45 billion set for the year.