Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA) Commissioner General Kingsley Chanda has urged Zambian owned business entities to take advantage of the Request for Expressions of Interest that the Authority advertises by bidding for such tenders.
The Commissioner General says it is in the interest of the Authority and the Country to ensure that local business houses are given priority in the awarding of contracts in order to empower and enable them to contribute to the national economy.
Mr. Chanda has expressed concern over the low number of entities that had bid for the expression of interest for the appointment of Tax Collection Agents in the informal sector.
He says only a few companies bid to collect the four tax types as advertised by the Authority, out of which nine reached the technical stage and were shortlisted for the submission of technical proposals for another evaluation process.
It was after this process that three entities namely First Alliance Bank Limited, Sherwood Greene and the Zambia National Marketeers Credit Association (ZANAMACA) were awarded contracts to collect taxes on behalf of ZRA.
First Alliance Bank was awarded the contract to collect Turnover Tax, Sherwood Greene to collect Withholding Tax on rental income and ZANAMACA to collect base tax.
On 15th, 18th and 21st, August, 2017 ZRA advertised in the Times of Zambia, Daily Mail and Daily Nation Newspapers respectively requesting companies interested in partnering with the Authority to collect Turnover Tax, Base Tax, Presumptive Tax on Taxis and minibuses and Withholding tax on Rental Income, on behalf of the Government of Zambia to submit the bids.
Mr. Chanda says the appointment of the tax collection Agents is in line with the provisions of Section 7 of the Income Tax Act, Chapter 323 of the Laws of Zambia, which allows the Commissioner General to appoint tax agents to collect base tax, presumptive tax, turnover tax and tax on rental income.
On 15th June, 2018 Finance Minister Margaret Mwanakatwe signed into law the Statutory Instrument (SI) number 48 of 2018 for the appointment of tax collection agents.
This is contained in a statement issued to the media by ZRA Corporate Communications Manager Topsy Sikalinda.