{"id":302111,"date":"2017-03-16T09:00:02","date_gmt":"2017-03-16T09:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=302111"},"modified":"2017-03-16T09:00:02","modified_gmt":"2017-03-16T09:00:02","slug":"parliament-approves-amendment-bills-for-tax-cuts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/03\/parliament-approves-amendment-bills-for-tax-cuts\/","title":{"rendered":"Parliament approves amendment Bills for tax cuts"},"content":{"rendered":"
Parliament on Wednesday\u00a0approved four amendment Bills to scrap taxes as proposed in the 2017 budget.<\/p>\n
The Bills are the Income Tax (Amendment) Bill, Special Petroleum Tax (Amendment) Bill, Special Import (Amendment) Bill and Customs and Excise (Petroleum Taxes and the Petroleum Related Levies (Repeal) Bill.<\/p>\n
[contextly_sidebar id=”Yzaw9SqNGCKTp0b4oJ0Z2kicqJvqbbRd”]The Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, expressed optimism that the cuts would aid the government’s goal to stimulate economic growth.<\/p>\n
“We are really excited that the signal is being given that these taxes need to be repealed so that the general welfare of people will be increased and that there will be tax reliefs,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The Finance Minister told\u00a0Citi News<\/strong>\u00a0he was grateful for the overwhelming approval from Parliament, stating that \u201cwe expect to meet the targets that we have, and we look forward to a good year.\u201d<\/p>\n The approval of the 2017 budget itself was not that\u00a0smooth, following\u00a0protests from the Minority<\/a><\/strong><\/span> Members of Parliament.<\/p>\n According to the Minority, the House lacked the\u00a0quorum at the time of the budget approval. In a Citi News<\/strong> interview, the Minority Chief Whip, Muntaka Mubarak, accused the Speaker of Parliament, Mike Ocquaye of exhibiting some bias in the matter.<\/p>\n