Ghana signs agreement with the Netherlands to combat tax evasion

The state-run Ghana News Agency (GNA) said the MOU allows both countries to “automatically provide each other with information about income from immovable property earned by residents of either country, dividends, interest, directors’ fees and income of artists and sportsmen”.

The commissioner-general of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) George Blankson said the MOU would help tax authorities in both countries “to better carry out the provisions” of the international ‘Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters’.

According to the GNA, the MOU is the first such agreement to be signed by the countries. In addition, the Netherlands’ ambassador to Ghana, Hans Docter, said both sides were reviewing a tax treaty on double taxation “to include anti-abuse clauses to make it difficult for multinational companies to evade taxes”.

Docter said that as the countries’ “economic relationships become increasingly important, an efficient exchange of information is essential”.

In January 2014, tax authorities in the Netherlands and the GRA signed an MOU on a “broad range of cooperation in tax matters, to assist the GRA in its further development towards a modern tax and customs administration”, the GNA said.

In March 2014, Ghana’s government was urged to review national investment policies and laws “in order to check the massive loss of revenues from the extractive industries through corruption, tax evasion and other forms of illicit financial flows”. A meeting of policymakers and civil society organisations claimed that some tax treaties “had been used as conduits to shift profits from Ghana”.

Last April, Ghana’s finance ministry said it was changing tax exemptions procedures to “minimise abuse, tax evasion and tax avoidance”. In addition the ministry said the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) Act would be reviewed “to ensure that (tax) exemptions granted by the GIPC are consistent with the government’s exemption policy”.

Tax expert Heather Self of Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law.com said that the action taken by Ghana was in line with a worldwide trend towards greater transparency in tax matters.

"More than 60 countries have signed up to the OECD's Convention on Mutual Assistance, and this agreement by Ghana shows that the trend for automatic information exchange is rapidly spreading on a global basis," she said.