Goil Ghana reacts to claims that it was the worst oil marketing company for 2018 after refusing to pay taxes

Goil reacts to claims that it was the worst oil marketing company for 2018
This follows a report from the Auditor General’s department.
The company said contrary to the report, it has fulfilled all its tax obligations to the state.
Goil said it is in talks with the GRA and the Auditor-General’s office for them to correct the error.

According to the company, it has fulfilled all its tax obligations to the state and described the claims as “unfounded” on the basis that it was premised on erroneous information by the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA).

The oil company made the revelation in a statement it issued.

Background

Recently, a report from Ghana’s Auditor General named Goil Ghana as the worst Oil Marketing Company in the country.

The report noted that GOIL defaulted in the payment of excise duties, taxes and levies amounting to 27,688,978.98 cedis and MGO liftings amounting to 497,490 cedis.

GOIL’s Report

But the management of GOIL insisted that it does “not owe the GRA” contrary to what has been published in the 2018 Auditor General’s report.

It explained the declarations listed by the GRA, which was captured in the GCNet system, were based on errors which operators of the system promised to expunge when their attention was drawn to the issue.

It said, “In August 2018 it received a letter from the Commissioner of Customs Divisions in connection with the recovery of taxes and levies for petroleum lifting for the period January 2013 to December 2017 amounting to 19,921,401,62 cedis,” adding that, “GOIL promptly responded by communicating to the GRA using our analyzed schedule to point out that all taxes and levies had been paid for the period in question.”

The company said it specifically pointed out that the declarations listed by the GRA in their letter had errors in them which could not be corrected via the GCNet system, and that new declarations had to be made to replace them.

The way forward

“Subsequent to GOIL submitting new declaration it was realized that the old declaration was still on the GCNet system which obviously created a duplication of GOIL’s declarations on the GCNet,” the company explained.

GOIL further noted that it was “reliably informed” by the GCNet that the erroneous declarations would be expunged from the records after a month from the date of declaration.

GOIL said it has in the meantime communicated to the GRA and the Auditor-General’s office for them to correct the error “to reflect our current tax position, and in particular, clarify any misconceptions raised as a result of the publication of the Auditor-General’s report.”