NTV PANORAMA: Uganda bleeding tax revenues in incentives, exemptions
Did you know that between 2010 and 2017, Uganda lost an estimated 3 billion dollars or 11 trillion Shillings, through tax incentives and exemptions doled out imprudently to multinationals and politically connected investors by the government in the bid to attract Foreign Direct Investment, which losses it is hoped will be offset by the oncoming windfall from commercial oil production? However, a study last month by Oxfam detailed that more than 1 trillion Shillings from oil earnings has been already surrendered as a result of the International Oil Companies—French Total E&P, and China’s CNOOC—rerouting their Ugandan subsidiaries through the Netherlands, with which Uganda has an unsavoury Double Taxation Treaty, and is also among the world’s top corporate tax paradises in the league of Bermuda and the Cayman Islands.