Malawi has been elected the vice chair of the Forum for VAT Administrators in Africa (VADA) at the organization’s 17th Annual Conference held in Kampala, Uganda.

The host country has been elected chair and the Commissioner for Domestic Taxes at Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) Henry Saka is by default the new chairman of VADA.

The Commissioner General of the Malawi Revenue Authority (MRA) will have the discretion to choose who specifically should be the vice-chairperson of VADA to represent the Authority and the country as a whole.

MRA’s Commissioner for Domestic Taxes Nellie Jimu, who attended the conference, said the election of Malawi underlines the country’s commitment to VADA.

“Malawi has been elected vice-chair because we are very active in VADA. We participate in all technical workshops, committees and annual conferences,” she said.

Deputy Commissioner Large Taxpayers Office (LTO) McDonald Chambukira and Electronic Fiscal Devices (EFD) Manager Bentry Khonje accompanied Jimu to the conference.

During the conference, the Malawi delegation made a presentation on the implementation of EFDs and the challenges it is facing.

The two-day annual conference was held from 23-24 November, 2016 under the theme “Maximizing Tax Revenue through E-commerce”.   

Malawi hosted the 10th annual conference in Lilongwe in 2007, becoming the VADA chair and the then MRA Deputy Commissioner General Raphael Kamoto was chairman.

VADA was conceived with a major purpose of creating a platform for Africa’s VAT administrations to exchange ideas, experience, skills and information on tax administration.

Membership is open to African tax administrations responsible for administering VAT in their countries, whether in a segregated or integrated institutional structure.

 
The forum started with four members namely Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda and now has thirteen participating countries including Malawi.

The forum started with a communiqué issued in Nairobi, Kenya in November 1998. Initially, the secretariat was located in Nairobi, until August 2001, when the forum adopted its constitution in Livingstone, Zambia and decided to move the secretariat to Accra – Ghana.

By Wadza Otomani