Former Finance Minister and Presidential Advisor on the Economy, Seth Terkper, has urged policymakers to maintain consistency in Ghana’s tax policies, cautioning that frequent changes are undermining compliance and discouraging business growth.
Speaking at a Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) stakeholder event in Accra, Mr. Terkper said the country’s tax system has suffered from constant reversals influenced by political transitions and leadership changes, which prevent reforms from delivering their intended results.
“I’m appealing that we allow policies to be sustained over a period instead of changing them, whether with a political cycle, with a commissioner-general, or with a minister. This is a global practice,” he said.
Reintroducing a Simplified System
Mr. Terkper explained that the recently modified tax system — a reintroduction after ten years — aims to simplify tax administration for small and medium-sized businesses.
The system merges income tax and VAT obligations into a single turnover-based calculation, replacing complex record-keeping and refund processes that often discourage compliance.
“The idea was to ease the burden of keeping multiple records for income and VAT, which is very cumbersome for small businesses,” he noted.
Learning from the Past
The former Finance Minister recalled earlier reforms under the late President John Atta Mills, including the presumptive income tax system, which sought similar goals of simplification and efficiency. However, he lamented that such measures were often repealed or redesigned before yielding full benefits.
He warned that constant experimentation with tax systems erodes public confidence and disrupts business planning, particularly for small enterprises that rely on predictability.
A Call for Policy Maturity
Mr. Terkper emphasised that tax reforms must be allowed to mature over time to deliver real results. Sustained implementation, he said, would build trust between taxpayers and the state while boosting long-term revenue collection.
“Most countries are simplifying their tax systems for small businesses to comply. Ghana must do the same and give these reforms the time to work,” he stressed.
For Seth Terkper, Ghana’s fiscal progress depends not on introducing new taxes every few years, but on letting well-designed policies breathe and evolve.
