Govt establishes debt management office
NATIONAL debt will soon come under effective and professional control, thanks to the national debt management office whose establishment is reportedly in the final stages, the national assembly heard on Friday.
Deputy Finance Minister Mwigulu Nchemba under the envisaged office, the national debt will be effectively, efficiently and closely monitored from the loan application to the repayment stage.
Mr Nchemba was responding to a supplementary question by Cecilia Paresso (Special Seats—Chadema) who decried weak management of the national debt, demanding to know the government strategy to intensify control on the debt.
The lawmaker, in the main question, wanted to hear the government statement on the controller and Auditor General’s audit report of 2012/13 that showed 1.2trn/- debt whose repayment ceased since the start of negotiations to have them cancelled.
The deputy minister concurred with the CAG report but said the figure should not be perceived as cash money but an amount that the country owes the Paris Club and non-club members.
He said the government stopped repaying the debt following the agreements under the highly indebted poor countries initiatives under which the creditors had to relieve the debtors of the debt repayment obligations.
The government was still negotiating with its creditors to exempt the country from repaying the debt under the Paris Club arrangement.
The creditors with which the government is negotiating for the debt cancellation are Brazil, Japan, Angola, Iran, Romania, China and Iraq, said Mr Nchemba, hinting that hitherto Japan and Zambia have cancelled the 515bn/- debt.
Meanwhile, the government has dismissed as unfounded claims that vehicles imported to Tanzania mainland through Zanzibar were subjected to double taxation by Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA).
Mr Nchemba said TRA taxes imported used vehicles equally as per the tax legislation, clarifying that Tanzania mainland uses the used motor vehicle valuation system, which is not used in Zanzibar.
“Because Zanzibar does not use this system, all vehicles entering the mainland from Zanzibar are subjected to re-evaluation and TRA collects only the difference in taxable amount and not double taxing…when the amount paid in Zanzibar is equal to the amount from the re-evaluation, there is no tax charged,” said the deputy minister.
He was answering a question by Jaku Hashim Ayoub (House of Representatives— CCM) who wanted to know why TRA was double taxing vehicles entering the mainland from Zanzibar.
Mr Nchemba decried cheating in importation of used vehicles, maintaining that the tax agency will keep using the prevailing market prices to compute taxes on imported vehicles.
