. Mutati

By HELEN ZULU –
FINANCE Minister Felix Mutati says the various tax measures that are outlined in the 2018 National Budget are aimed at reducing Government’s dependency on donor funds to finance future budgets.
Mr Mutati said the tax measures were aimed at enabling government to collect more revenue to finance the budget as opposed to depending on support from cooperating partners.
He was speaking during KPMG Zambia limited 2018 budget analysis breakfast meeting in Lusaka yesterday.
“As you are aware, we cannot grow our economy on the basis of waiting for help from somewhere, we need to ensure that we raise our own resources to fund the budget, so we can only do that through collecting the various taxes.
“ You cannot have a benefit without paying the price, let’s not be a nation of recipients but a nation of recipients and givers. You can’t receive value without paying for it,” Mr Mutati said.
KPMG senior partner and chief executive officer Jason Kazilimani said the institution was happy that government had put in place measures to control borrowing activities of the Government by having the National Assembly approve loans before they were contracted.
He said this would improve the governance levels and control borrowing activities of the government.
Mr Mutati said, Government would in the 2018 National budget be implementing the medium term debt strategy 2017/2019 published in September this which would focus on repealing the Loans and Guarantees (Authorisation) Act and replace it with a bill that will enhance oversight over the borrowing activities of the government by having the National Assembly approve loans before they were contracted.
“Infrastructure development fund, is also, good for future infrastructure development. For me I think the budget is good, what remains now is implementation,” Mr Kazilimani said.
National Development Planning Lucky Mulusa said Government would in January 2018 begin implementing a Performance Management System to ensure funds were well-utilised.
“We need to work together to ensure that the money that has been allocated to each sector is well utilised and that’s why we will be implementing the Performance Management System to deal with this issue,” he said.