Story by Peter Chivhima
THE government is planning to review the legislative framework to combat smuggling and tax evasion by imposing stricter and more prohibitive penalties.
Government is taking this tough stance to curtail the influx of smuggled goods into the domestic market to protect local industry from unfair competition with authorities.
This was revealed by the Permanent Secretary for Presidential Affairs and Devolution in the Office of the President and Cabinet Engineer Tafadzwa Muguti in an interview with the ZBC News.
“The raids will continue, the inspections at all border posts will continue, the arrests will continue, and we are now going to be also looking into the legislative agenda to ensure that smuggling is one of the greatest crimes of tax evasion in this country. We need a national law that we put in place so that people who are smugglers actually see jail time, we need to protect the economy, we need to protect our currency,” Engineer Muguti said.
Engineer Muguti also said the government’s efforts to curb smuggling are bearing fruit.
“For the first time in as much as 10 years, we did not see a leap of the currency on the black market, now we see any changes. We actually saw stability of both the black market and the former market right into general in February, and we’ve been stable since. One of the reasons why we were so strong on the anti-smuggling is that we need to start promoting our local industries. We cannot afford to sabotage our local industries,” he said.
The establishment of an anti-smuggling taskforce and awareness campaigns are among the measures put in place by the government to protect the local industry.
