Prof. Prasad says Kumar is lying in Parliament while Usamate tells him to stop making personal attacks

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance Professor Biman Prasad says Opposition Bloc of 16 Member Premila Kumar is lying in the Parliament on how VAT is applied while Opposition Bloc of 16 MP Jone Usamate has told Professor Prasad that he should not be making personal attacks on people.

This comes as Professor Prasad was responding to a question by Kumar on the additional VAT on goods received from overseas.

Professor Prasad says the threshold for personal imports has been reduced from $2,000 to $1,000 and 15 percent VAT is now levied on that effective from 28th of June.

The Deputy Prime Minister says Kumar’s question is a bit flawed as there is no such thing as additional VAT however, he explained that the threshold from $500 was increased to $2,000 during COVID to provide a temporary relief to those who wanted to import at that time.

He says they found a lot of instances of misuse where certain individuals and retailers had imported and sold goods, avoiding VAT, creating unfair advantage where some people were running businesses from home.

Kumar then questioned the Minister whether VAT came into effect on the 28th of July when the official budget document says VAT comes into effect on 1st August, and which one is correct.

Professor Prasad says Kumar's understanding on how VAT is applied is wrong as under the Customs Tariff Act, import excise duty comes into effect on the day the budget is announced.

While highlighting a facebook post by Kumar to prove that her understanding is wrong, Professor Prasad says she had posted that it is unbelievable that as a result of 15 percent VAT, 500 grams of butter is almost the price of chicken.

While asking a question, Usamate says Professor Prasad needs to learn that when he answers a question, he should just answer it.

Meanwhile, independent MP Alvick Maharaj says it does not matter to him if it comes into effect on the 28th of July or the 1st of August but what actually does matter is that courier companies are telling people, that they did not get anybody to process the VAT in their company and now it's an additional burden.

He says these companies are charging additional agency fee or administration fee and is requesting the Minister for Finance to please investigate.

While responding, Professor Prasad says to facilitate VAT payments, electronic payment systems like MPAiSA, MyCash and internet banking can be utilized.

He says they have also asked the the Fiji Revenue and Customs Service to deploy additional staff to assist freight companies and options like pre-clearance and prepayment are available for courier companies and freight stations to enhance operational efficiency but they will also check on what additional charges they are putting on.