Reduce E-Levy rate to 0.5% – Dr. Assibey-Yeboah urges government

Former Chairman of Parliament’s Finance Committee, Dr. Mark Assibey-Yeboah, has urged the government to seriously consider reducing the rate for the Electronic Transfer Levy (E-Levy), from the current 1.5 percent to 0.5 percent.

Dr. Assibey-Yeboah suggested that, the government has not been able to meet its revenue target for the levy because the current rate is too high. This he says has led to a lot of Ghanaians boycotting the use of mobile money service.

He added that, since the implementation of the levy the government has only raised only GH¢ 93.7 million which is way below the over GH¢ 1 billion target, it set.

He, therefore, urged the government to reduce the current E-Levy rate to ensure that it becomes more acceptable to Ghanaians.

“May-June E-levy revenue was 93.7M out of a programmed 1.46B. How about lowering the rate to, say, 0.5% and widening the coverage? Just food for thought,” a tweet shared by Dr. Assibey-Yeboah, who is a former NPP Member of Parliament, read.

Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta, during the presentation of the 2022 Mid-year Budget Review Statement, failed to mention the E-Levy even though he said that some of the government’s revenue mobilisation measures had been frustrated.

Many officials of the government have blamed the failure of the levy to meet its targets on the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC). They claim that the NDC’s rejection of the levy is behind the refusal of Ghanaians to patronise it.

View the tweet shared by Dr. Assibey-Yeboah below:

May-June E-levy revenue was 93.7M out of a programmed 1.46B. How about lowering the rate to, say, 0.5% and widening the coverage? Food for thought.

— Mark Assibey-Yeboah (@markassibey) July 26, 2022