FBR officers revolt against reform plan – Newspaper

ISLAMABAD: In a rare movement, almost 23 chief commissioners of Inland Revenue in a meeting with the president of the Federal Revenue Board (FBR), Shabbar Zaidi, demanded that the government withdraw the proposed reform measures for the tax authority within two days. But they were not clear about their course of action after two days if the government did not comply with its ultimatum.

In several conversations with Dawn, a couple of them mentioned the word "strike" or raised the possibility of a "pen stroke", but refrained from issuing any threat collectively. It was the second meeting of the main tax officials in the last days in which they expressed their reservations about the proposed measure.

Shortly after the meeting arrived on Twitter, the FBR president thanked all IRS Inland Revenue chief commissioners for what he called a "very productive meeting."

Allow two days to withdraw the measures; demand more voice in future plans

"The restructuring / transformation of the RBA will take place after taking into account the comments of all interested parties," he promised in the tweet. "The entire organization will be taken into account, including all levels of staff."

However, President FBR was contacted by phone, but was not willing to be cited on the subject. "There is nothing to worry about," he said, adding that he has already stated that the reforms will be carried out in consultation with all interested parties, including the IRS.

He also insisted that FBR is on the target regarding revenue collection and ruled out talking about a growing revenue deficit, noting that revenue growth was 16 percent in the first four months of the fiscal year.

According to the reform measures that the government is considering, it is proposed to abolish the post of 23 principal commissioners who head the regional tax offices (RTO) and Large Taxpayer Units (LTU) throughout the country. As a result, 174 commissioners will now be required to inform members of Inland Revenue operations directly.

A statement issued after the meeting by the Association of IRS Officers began by expressing support for the creation of a unified Pakistan Revenue Authority, as foreseen in the government reform effort, but did not agree with the administrative structure which is proposed for the organism.

"The IRS supports the documentation campaign and is part of this unit and would continue to be, and would fully support the harmonized General Sales Tax and ensure that the political government extends all support in the implementation of these reforms," ​​the statement said.

The only point of disagreement of the IRS officers is what the statement called the "vague, half-cooked and misleading administrative structure proposed for the ARP and, secondly, the deadlines in which the implementation of the proposed structure is done before of the beginning of the ARP ".

"The implementation of the proposed structure must be stopped immediately and all stakeholders must be taken into account for the effective implementation of the vision of Prime Minister Imran Khan," he continued.

An official source aware of the meeting told Dawn that IRS officials also asked the president why the government's focus is only to introduce reforms within the FBR. They affirmed that FBR's performance is clear from the numbers in which revenue collection was improved from Rs1 billion to more than Rs5tr since 2010.

He said commissioners also demanded to know why the government has no plans to introduce reforms in many other organizations. "We have transmitted to the president to take our complaints to the main government officials," he said.

On October 3, the Secretariat of the Prime Minister convened a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Imran Khan to approve the proposed structure of the ARP and field formations.

Posted in Dawn, November 6, 2019