Yatani meets KRA, challenges it to be innovative in sealing tax loopholes

Acting Treasury CS Ukur Yatani on Tuesday challenged the Kenya Revenue Authority to be more innovative in sealing tax loopholes.

Yatani, who is also the Labour CS, challenged KRA to invest in innovative technologies that will increase revenue for development.

Yatani took over from Henry Rotich last week after an anti-corruption court barred him from accessing his office over a graft case.

Addressing KRA senior management team at Times Tower, Yatani said that as part of the managing the ever-ballooning public wage bill and the tax burden, KRA should "generate more revenue to fund public service programmes as part of being self-reliant."

He said KRA should surpass revenue collection targets so that the ballooning debt burden is reduced.

"The government has empowered the body with multi-agency experts and hence, there is no reason why KRA cannot meet or even surpass revenue collection targets, if the right technology is deployed," he said.

The CS said tax leakages and misuse and plunder of public resources denies the government the much-needed resources to adequately deliver quality services and development, including the Big Four agenda.

"All the loopholes need to be sealed so that these resources are put into proper use to benefit the taxpayer," Yatani said. 

The top KRA chiefs were led by Commissioner General James Mburu.

Yatani asserted that corruption and tax evasion should not be tolerated,

He also tasked the tax agency to strategize on how best to seal porous borders to check influx and flight of goods through smuggling.

The CS was accompanied by Treasury Principal Secretary Julius Muia and his Planning counterpart Torome Saitoti.