By Dismas Nuwaine
Recently, the URA tax education team took to Uganda Christian University (UCU) to attend the Business exhibition. The two-day event saw students parade a flurry of young business startups with the potential to explode into big business franchises.
This atmosphere was especially ripe for a thorough exposition of the guiding principles of formalizing and operating a young tax-compliant business from scratch. Isaac Aijuka, a tax education officer wasted no time in doing exactly this.
“We shared with them the starter pack, from business formalization to record-keeping and then the core tenants of the presumptive tax. We also advised them on the importance of filing returns and that tax can only be paid by businesses that make profits,” said Isaac.
Aijuka revealed that the students, even those pursuing fields other than business majors were very inquisitive on several matters pertaining to the country’s taxation structure and appreciated the tax body’s efforts to educate its publics.
“The students especially those in their final years and those still studying but are having their side hustles were most inquisitive. The law students appreciated URA’s efforts in providing tax literature. We had several copies of the taxation handbooks and we distributed these to students who showed great interest,” said Isaac.
Lwanga Huzeifah, the president UCU tax society commended the URA team for taking off time to make it for the event and for the golden nuggets shared with the current business entrepreneurs at the exhibition.
“These are the key figures in taxation who have the ultimate information. A student can pose a question where we as the tax society may not have as much information to answer sufficiently, if we provide 20%, the URA team provides the 80% meaning that the person who has posed the question has benefited a lot,” said Lwanga.
Aijuka also added that the tax body encourages the creation of tax societies to inculcate the system of paying taxes in the minds of young people.
“Our brand as tax education is to bring tax information to all Ugandans and the spirit of paying tax must be inculcated in the minds of young people even at a primary level,” said Aijuka.
