The Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) has arrested officials from three China Mall branches in Ashaiman, Weija and Nsawam on suspicion of tax evasion, following undercover operations that exposed the use of unauthorised invoicing platforms.
The arrests came after intelligence-led investigations, which included mystery shopping exercises, revealed that a number of sales transactions at the outlets had not been recorded on the GRA’s approved Electronic VAT (E-VAT) system. Wisdom Kofi Xetor, Head of the GRA’s Revenue Protection Unit, addressed the media following the operation, explaining that officers had made purchases at the Ashaiman branch and subsequently verified whether those transactions appeared on the authority’s system.
“We made purchases and went through the transactions. After that, we verified whether the transactions had been captured on our system, and we discovered that some of them had not been reflected,” Xetor said.
He added that the invoices issued at the outlets did not comply with the GRA’s approved invoicing standards, raising concerns that proceeds from certain sales had been deliberately diverted. “Even the invoices issued did not conform to our approved invoicing system. Ashaiman, Weija and Nsawam are the three areas we visited today,” he said.
Xetor confirmed that investigations are ongoing to determine the full extent of the suspected tax evasion across the three locations.
He said the authority is actively pursuing prosecution in cases where deliberate violations are established, with offenders facing prison sentences of up to five years. The GRA noted that China Mall operates multiple outlets across Ghana, and that the three branches targeted in this operation were selected based on intelligence gathered prior to the arrests.
SOURCE: yen.com