Ninety One Companies And Clearing Agents To Pay GH¢14bn To State For Fraud

Ninety-one companies and Clearing agents have been issued notices to pay about GH¢ 14 billion owed the state through fraudulent business activities last year. 

The companies have been given a 30-day ultimatum to refund the money, failure of which would result in a penalty of up to three hundred percent, in addition to legal action. 

The Special Operations Unit of the Office of the President issued the demand notices to the companies and clearing agents. 

A Deputy Commissioner in Charge of Operations at the Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority, Frederick Gavor in a letter to the companies, said all legal and court related costs in connection with the recovery would be borne by the individual companies. 

Individual companies served with notices are required to submit their payment receipts to the Chairman of the SOU, Nii Adote Din Barima as evidence of payment.

The Fraudulent activities include underpayment of revenue to the state, while others engaged the services of multiple destination inspection companies and ended up underpaying their permits. 

Nii Barima said investigations by the unit's monitoring team had established a connection between domestic tax and financial accounts fraud as well as warehousing fraud.

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