According to the data of the Administration for Indirect Taxation (IUO) BiH, this year, as of yesterday, 6,346,853,462.20 BAM were collected, which is 983,399,440.31 BAM more than in the first eight months of the record-breaking last year.
“With the remaining two days of August, in the first eight months, we will exceed one billion marks in collected public revenues in the field of indirect taxes. This is an impressive result, with around 20 percent growth, much higher than both inflation and gross domestic product growth. This is an indicator that companies in Bosnia and Herzegovina achieve added value, operate positively, and I thank all taxpayers who regularly pay their obligations,” Miro Dzakula, director of the ITABiH, told Avaz.
However, what the ITA does not say is that revenues increased during the period of the highest inflation and record prices, while, on the other hand, the government does not want to abolish excise taxes, which would make fuel cheaper by 40 pfennigs.
When it comes to the temporary abolition of VAT on basic foodstuffs, Džakula points out that the Law on the Indirect Taxation System stipulates that the Management Board leads the policy of indirect taxes, regulates laws and proposes solutions to the Council of Ministers, but that in this case the opposite situation happened.
“Amendments to laws that are crucial for the fiscal stability of the state must not be done lightly, without calculations, analyses, macroeconomic indicators of how it will be reflected. Believe me, we in the ITA have no communication with the Parliament nor do we know which version they adopted, what they adopted or not. I am afraid that the tax issue is being treated as a matter of pre-election rhetoric, which is not the case in any normal and developed country,” Džakula pointed out.
“Therefore, I would ask all those interested to focus on other issues in the political campaign, on the economy, and not on changes in the law that lead us, I won’t say to hell, but certainly to tax uncertainty,” said Džakula.
