Acting Commissioner-General of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), Anthony Sarpong is objecting to claims that the authorities did not consult the stakeholders of the mining sector before the introduction of the increase in the Growth and Sustainability Levy in the 2025 budget statement.
This pushback from the GRA boss comes on the heels of the claims made by the Ghana Chamber of Mines that there were no consultations before the introduction of the hike in the levy from 1% to 3%.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Chamber of Mines, Sulemana Koney says they were blindsided by the hike which could negatively impact investments in the sector. He therefore maintains that the announcement lacked proper engagement.
Amidst these concerns by the Chamber, the Acting-Commissioner-General rather reveals broad engagements were held with key players and they had no objections to the hike in the levy.
Speaking at a forum on the 2025 budget, Anthony Sarpong rather indicated that the key players during the engagements before the budget raised no objections to the hike. In his own words, these players accepted the proposal with a smile.
“I am happy to announce that they accepted with a smile to pay some of the taxes. So the increase in the levy that you talked about that you are worried about, it was accepted with a smile,” he said at the budget forum.
Justifying the need for a hike in growth and sustainability levy, Anthony Sarpong, therefore, argued that the gold sector is currently experiencing a windfall as gold prices on the international market have significantly increased. This means the mining sector is raking in significant revenues, hence the authorities found it reasonable to impose additional levies on the sector.
“Gold prices have jumped over the roof but we don’t have in Ghana at the moment the short-term windfall taxes when prices have jumped over the roof. We know the extractive industry is making all the profits, but we don’t have those taxes so we actually did engage some of the key mining players,” he insisted.
He added: “We didn’t just bring it in, we did the consultation and we made sure that we jaw-jaw with them and agreed on what would be reasonable.”
The seeming contradiction between the GRA’s stance and the mining industry’s response raises critical questions: Was there genuine consensus among key stakeholders, or was the government’s engagement insufficient? And if industry players truly accepted the levy increase with a smile, why has the Chamber of Mines expressed such strong reservations?
It is therefore anticipated that given the concerns expressed by the Chamber, the government will continue to engage these stakeholders further to court their support going forward.
