By Irene Kabakama
The Chinese Consular, Her Excellency Jiang Jiqing, paid a courtesy call to Uganda Revenue Authority today morning,to identify areas for capacity building support for the tax collecting body.
H.E Jiang Jiqing said the team is focusing on providing URA with technical capacity building opportunities, Chinese Government scholarships for staff, tax education for the Chinese community in Uganda, training programmes on the tax methods, reviewing the Double Taxation Agreement between China and Uganda, and donation of equipment by the Chinese Cooperation to URA.
She was accompanied by Zhang Hao the secretary to the consular and Shadia Nampomba the chairman of the Chinese chamber of commerce.
URA CG, John Rujoki Musinguzi, was delighted with the offer for capacity building support and also appreciated the partnership with the Consular’s office, noting the significant boost they added to URA through the provision of technology through the non- intrusive scanners and the EFRIS system that was signed two years ago. CG promised that URA will extend better support to their office to counter the challenges they encounter with the Taxman.
The Commissioner Domestic Taxes (CDT) Sarah Chelangat Muzungyo, noted that the issuance of e-invoices has improved transparency in the taxpayer’s transactions and emphasis should be laid on system to system integration.
For capacity building, URA requested the Consular to offer focused support towards simplifying EFRIS system integration to ease compliance for VAT registered taxpayers, and also boost staff skills in oil and gas sector to focus on both the upstream and midstream.
“Since we have been offered capacity building opportunities, can we have some scholarship offers for master’s programs in oil and gas, and also provide some training in Chinese languages,” CG Musinguzi noted.
The double taxation agreement review, with focus on the areas of e-Commerce and oil and gas, will help the two countries identify common areas that reduce revenue collection by poor countries, create unfair distribution of tax rights, and in some cases facilitate double non-taxation.
