A local Civil Society Organisation (CSO) has demanded the urgent introduction of wealth tax to facilitate the trickledown effect of financial resources to the country’s poor section in a bid to reduce poverty levels.
The Zimbabwe Fight Inequality Alliance, a broad-based 18 member NGOs network’s spokesperson, Janet Zhou declared a week of action, piling pressure on the government to introduce a tax for the country’s wealthiest. She told NewZimbabwe.com:
We are calling for the introduction and implementation of a wealth tax to facilitate the redistribution of wealth from people who have too much of it in order to meet the needs of the suffering majority. The abolishment of unjust and harmful tax incentives to multinational corporations is a long overdue outcome of a stakeholder consultative process.
Poverty in Zimbabwe has risen to unsustainable levels surging to 7,9 million people plunging into extreme poverty. Surprisingly, the rich, political elites and wealthy corporations registered an incredible rise in wealth and assets whose origins are unfortunately a result of illicit public transfers into the hands of a few individuals.
The remarks coincided with the commemorations of the Global Week of Action against Inequality which kicked off on January 15, 2022, which is also running a similar theme, Time To Tax the Rich and build People’s Recovery Plans for Covid-19.
Zhou stressed that it is time the government introduced a COVID-9 Windfall Tax for corporates and individuals who made huge profits since 2020 to fund a just and equitable response to COVID-19-induced poverty and suffering.
She also proposed the urgent scrapping of the 2% tax or the alternative of pegging it above the Poverty Datum Line (PDL) which currently stands at $48 054 for a family of six.
Zhou also called for the acceleration of lifestyle audits by the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC) together with the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority.
More: NewZimbabwe