Concerned Betters of Ghana oppose 10% tax on bet wins

The Ghana Revenue Authority’s order to apply a 10% withholding tax to all prizes has drawn the ire of the Concerned Betters of Ghana.

The implementation process will begin on August 15, 2023.

All gross gaming profits will be subject to a 10% withholding tax.

The existing 15% Value Added Tax (VAT) on stakes will be eliminated, and the new tax would be levied on winnings income.

This change is in conformity with an adjustment to Act 1094 of the Income Tax Act 2023 (No. 2).

Mr. Edward Gyamerah, the Commissioner for the Domestic Tax Revenue Division of GRA, emphasized during a media event that gaming enterprises which disobey this guideline face consequences, including having their licenses revoked.

“As of August 15, it is anticipated that you will remit 10% to the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) during payments,” Mr. Gyamerah said. You are in charge of carrying out the withholding because you have been appointed as withholding agents.

Failure to comply, he warned, “will result in the assured withdrawal of your licenses after our discussions with you and in conjunction with the Gaming Commission.”

However, in response to the instruction, CBOG declared in a statement that Covener Richard Aguda had signed that: “We… reject the announcement by the GRA for the implementation of 10 per cent tax on all betting, games and lottery wins from Tuesday, 15 August 2023”.

“CBOG wishes to say that an attempt to go ahead to levy the ordinary Ghanaian, especially the youth in betting, in an already-tax-burdened society, is a recipe for chaos”, the statement said.

“Betting, games and lottery, have become an avenue for livelihood for millions of Ghanaians youth due to the unavailability of jobs and taking 10 per cent of its winnings is a scandalous means to pish the yiuth into more abject poverty”.

“The association, in its press release in April this year on the rejection of 10 per cent tax, was of the hope that the government would have listened to the plea of the teeming youth in betting but it was, as usual, ignored”, the group noted.

“Taxing the very source of survival for many Ghanahans in this currrent economic hardship is clueless and must be rejected”.

Source: Ghanatodayonline.com/Dominic Owusu Ansah