Luanda – Angola’s General Tax Administration (AGT) has ruled out the possibility of reducing Value Added Tax (VAT) in the coming months in the country, as reported on social media.
"There is no prospect so soon of a reduction or change in VAT in the country, without the creation of all the presuppositions required to change tax benefits", AGT director Tiago Santos said Monday in Luanda.
Answering questions from journalists at a press conference about the activities carried out in 2022 and in the first quarter of this year, Santos explained that any change to taxes obeys a series of requirements and needs to be approved by the National Assembly.
Santos said the country currently has four VAT rates: special regime in Cabinda, with a rate of 2 percent, two reduced rates of 5 percent and 7 percent, respectively, as well as the general regime of 14 percent.
VAT enables collection of Kz 290.2 billion in three months
During the first quarter of 2023 VAT was the main tax collected, totalling 290.2 billion kwanzas, which corresponds to a 30 percent share of the total collected and growth of 9 percent year on year, Tiago Santos said.
Since the implementation of VAT in 2019 to March 2023, around 608 taxpayers have requested refunds.
According to the source, the value of refund requests grew over the years, in 2022 was the year in which there were more requests for refunds of about 467 requests that amounted to Kz 14.2 billion. These requests resulted in the reimbursement of 60.5 billion kwanzas.
On the other hand, about 9,000 taxpayers have been registered in the general regime and report credits in their declarations, however, they do not request reimbursement (refund). In this way, the accumulated credit stands at around 700 billion kwanzas.
