Criticising collection of municipality tariffs on the city gates, High Office of Oversight and Anti-Corruption (HOOAC) said Sunday that the act would pave the ground for embezzlement of incomes and large amount of corruption, suggesting that to collect municipality tariffs transparently, the government should implement simple ways.
A council of ministers meeting in December decided to receive tariffs of imported goods to cities in a separate customs account, however the council decided last month that tariffs be collected on the city gates by the municipalities.
In reaction to the two contradicting decisions made by the council of ministers, the HOOAC said that in most cases policies in Afghanistan are made as desired by individuals and do not aim to resolve people's problems.
"Country's policies are made according to individual's desires.
Everybody wants to make policies the way they want and this is a big problem," said Azizullah Lodin, head of High Office of Oversight and Anti-Corruption, "We tried hard to remove the checkpoints from the roads, but they have started again."
"In my opinion, finding simpler ways and less interference from government staff will lead revenues to go directly into the state treasury, and these taxes must be collected legally if there is a transparent administration, but unfortunately experiences have shown that most of these taxes don't go to the state treasury," said Azrakhsh Hafizy, head of the international relations of Afghanistan Chamber of Commerce and Industries (ACCI).
Afghan Economy Minister, however, has said although the decision has been made based on increase of municipalities' revenues, municipalities are able to obtain tariffs only from trucks unloading in their cities.
"There shouldn't be any tariffs taken by municipalities from those commercial goods that pass through cities, but only from those which unload in the cities," said Abdul Hadi Arghandiwal, Minister of Economy.
The traders would pay a higher amount to the government than what has been already specified, if the process of collecting tariffs are carried out on the highways instead of being on the city gates, the ACCI suggested.