Algeria: 7 thousand billion Dinars in uncollected taxes… new mechanisms set for their retrieval

The Director General of the Tax Office, Mr. Abderrahmane Raouya said that the value of the uncollected taxes in the previous years amounted to seven thousand billion Algerian dinars which the relevant Directorate is seeking to retrieve together with the relevant sectors of activity through the implementation of brand-new and binding mechanisms.

He described this amount of still uncollected taxes as huge, while noting that there are several hurdles standing behind the failure of this required tax collection given that five thousand billion dinars in lingering taxes are on the shoulders of the banks, not on those of the citizens.

Mr Raouya told “Echorouk” on Monday on the sidelines of a parliamentary session devoted to the examining of the draft Finance law 2017 that the rate of tax proportion meant for collection during 2017, is set at more than 11 percent, especially after the various incentive measures, contained in the draft 2017 financial law, stressing that the tax agents had been instructed to greatly hike the rate of tax retrieval in all sectors of activity in order to help replenish the ailing Public Treasury.

Mr Abderrahmane Raouya said that “oil prices’ scathing fall imposed a management of this aspect”, ie how to improve the ordinary taxation. He emphasized that despite this situation, “Algeria was among the few countries to have recorded an appreciable yield of ordinary taxation”.

On this chapter, 4.500 billion DA going to projects of municipalities and government spending while the share devoted to the needs of management and equipment are between 6,000 and 7,000 billion DA, the shortfall being filled by the FRR Fund’s resources.

As such, Mr Raouya said the tax potential is yet to announce the launch of a census of economic operators in activity. In the same vein, he affirmed that there are no problems with Algerian companies activating in Algeria, and that they will pay their taxes.

Regarding debts arising from late payment penalties, he will say that companies work to pay their taxes, and there is possibility of reducing the payment. A major operation was also initiated in the past, to collect debts from distressed companies, which benefited from remedial solutions with on focus conditional remission, thus allowing these troubled companies to profit from a mitigation of tax penalties.