GRA must audit oil tax returns promptly – PIAC

The Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC) has urged Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) to expeditiously audit tax returns filed by the joint venture partners in the country’s oil sector.

It said an audit of Tullow’s tax returns covering 2011-2014 was done in 2015 while that of Kosmos covering 2011- 2015 was conducted in 2016.

Speaking at a public forum on management of Ghana’s petroleum revenues for the year 2017 in Kumasi yesterday, Chairman of PIAC, Dr Steve Manteaw said the Tullow and Kosmos Energy audit resulted in US$27,314,273 and US$34,116,939 respectively in additional taxes and penalties.

It was the 14th public forum to be organized by PIAC on the utilization and management of revenues from the petroleum sector.

According to Dr Manteaw, the committee appealed to GRA to conduct tax audits in a more expeditious and timely manner since the tax agency do not conduct any tax audit of the oil company in the year under review.

Dr Manteaw revealed that GRA should ensure that oil companies are properly apprised on the designated accounts into which payments should be lodged; pointing out that an amount of $13,518,852.98 was wrongfully paid into GRA account instead of the Petroleum Holding Fund (PHF) account in 2017.

He disclosed that this money has not been transferred into the coffers of PHF as required by Act 815 of the Petroleum Revenue Management Law.

He further revealed that an amount of $538,832,154.44 was paid into the PHF with $579,278.46 being earned as interest on undistributed funds held in the fund during the period.

According to him, an amount of $99,658.80 was also earned as premium on the sale of the Ghana Group’s second lifting from the Tweneboa-Enyenra-Ntomme (TEN) project, but the money has not been transferred to the PHF from Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC).

The PIAC Chairman said there was no lifting from the Sankofa Gye Nyame (SGN) field by the Ghana Group due to GNPC’s inability to meet its financial obligations to the Joint Venture Partnership.

He, however, commended GNPC for starting the processes of decommissioning the Saltpond field in line with PIAC’s previous recommendations and called on other relevant state actors and agencies to address other issues raised in previous reports.