Africa-Press – Gambia. Mr. Darboe, who was speaking in an interview with West Coast Radio on Friday, revealed that GRA is tasked to collect D13.5 billion this year. “The Authority is struggling very hard to ensure in achieving the set revenue target by end December 2022,” he stated.
“We speak, GRA has collected D7.4 billion and we are left with D6.07 billion to the end December of 2022.” Mr. Darboe described the recent Russia -Ukraine crisis as one of the causes of high fuel prices in the world market. He said that this prompted the government of The Gambia to spend a lot in terms of subsidising fuel prices from January to date.
“As we speak, both gasoil and petrol should have gone above hundred dalasi per litre but because the government has concern in this area – which led the government to spend a lot of subsidies monthly on behalf of the ordinary citizens.”
Mr. Darboe said that the government spent close to D291 million in May 2022 alone on fuel subsidy, and over D304 million in June. “If you look collectively from January to June, the government subsidies had gone up to D1.3 billion and this is ordinarily the revenue that GRA could have collected,” Mr. Darboe pointed out.
“It would have given us almost over 8 billion, then we would have left with minimal gap of D4 to 5 billion towards meeting our target.”
“But because of the current circumstances that we find ourselves in, the government had to do this and forgo that amount and make it a subsidy,” he said, adding despite all those challenges, GRA is still optimistic of achieving the set target by end December 2022.
He praised his institution for the excellent revenue performance over the years, and attributed those successes to the latest innovations, digitalisation system and strong human resources base at GRA.
He also spoke on the three million dalasis that the government is losing on a monthly basis due to fuel subsidy, saying “if government continues providing that amount of subsidy then it will not be possible for us to meet our target.”
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