Dear Editor,

It was instructive to learn from SN’s January 17 report, of the GRA’s increasing success in collecting tax from ‘various’ categories of taxpayers, including the ‘self-employed.’ This is certainly a heartening development. It would have been equally heartening to learn of the progress being made in respect of a donor-funded project initiated about four years ago, aimed, amongst other things, at linking electronically relevant data on business persons between the GRA, Deeds Registry and the NIS.

One objective, amongst others, important to the expeditious processing of the requirements of the business and investor communities, would have been to alert these collaborating agencies of the existence of these persons in whom they respectively would have an interest. For example, in the case of the self-employed, it meant that the management of NIS can then access the individual concerned regarding membership of the scheme.

The productive partnership which was contemplated would seem to have fallen into limbo. Some serious attempt should be made to resuscitate this project.

Yours faithfully,
E B John