My attention has been attracted to frantic attempts by certain NPP social media activists to distort a statement I made in the lead-up to the 2020 elections about sports betting.I stated in the aforementioned interview that the NDC will consider imposing a tax on sports betting “as it’s done in the UK” in response to a question on how the NDC planned to finance the Sports Development Fund we pledged in our 2020 platform.Therefore, the issue that every rational person should ask is: What rules apply to sports betting taxes in the UK?The solution is very easy!Bet winnings are not taxed in the UK. Instead, betting businesses pay high taxes.
See https://www.newbettingsites.co/articles/how-much-tax-do-betting-companies-pay/This is the instance I gave as one that the NDC government would take into account after 2020. The Akufo-Addo/Bawumia/NPP government’s new 10% tax on winning bets is the exact reverse of the UK’s law and the position I advocated for in 2020. Avoid being duped!The NDC fiercely opposes the 10% tax that the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia/NPP government has levied on bet winnings for the sake of clarity and emphasis.
- Sports betting although undesirable, has become a necessary evil given the state of hopelessness, joblessness and excruciating hardships that Ghanaian youths have been plunged into by the insensitive and reckless Akufo-Addo/Bawumia/NPP government.
- Taxing bet winnings under the current excruciating economic conditions Ghanaians are facing, particularly, the high rate of inflation of 43.1% and the highest unemployment rate among others, is insensitive and totally unacceptable.
- Government should be innovative in its bid to increase tax revenue and stop this lazy approach to taxation. If government is minded to raise tax revenue from betting, its focus should be on taxing multinational/foreign bet companies as it pertains in the UK and other jurisdictions and not poor Ghanaian youths who have been compelled by the harsh economic conditions in the country to seek refuge in sports betting for their very survival.
- More importantly, the new 10% tax on bet winnings introduced by the NPP contravenes the government’s social contract with Ghanaians. That social contract is to the effect that; “taxation is a lazy approach to governance” and that an NPP government will “reduce the tax burden on Ghanaians” and move the country from “taxation to production”.
Contrary to this promise, the current NPP government has introduced over 25 tax handles since they took office in 2017- a clear betrayal of the trust of Ghanaians. These taxes have conspired to make life unbearable for the vast majority of Ghanaians, particularly the youths who can’t find jobs.
The NDC will not and cannot lend its support to the double standards the NPP continues to display relative to taxation, particularly at this time of unprecedented hardships.
- Undoubtedly, Sports Betting has become a refuge for the millions of Ghanaian unemployed youths who have been compelled by the economic mismanagement of the NPP to depend on betting for survival. Imposing a 10% tax on bet winnings is therefore cruel. Given the difficult times we find ourselves in, the NDC fully supports calls for the immediate scrapping of the newly introduced 10% tax on bet winnings.
This is the official position of the great NDC on the newly-introduced 10% tax on bet winnings.
Sammy Gyamfi Esq.National Communications OfficerNational Democratic Congress
