Reliable sources have hinted radiogoldlive.com that government is likely to cough up 120 million dollars as judgment debt to the Ghana Community Network Services Limited (GCNet) if the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) goes ahead to implement the new UNIPASS trade facilitation system at the ports.
Currently GCNet which is regarded as having state of the art trade facilitating system is operating at the ports with its contract expected to expire by 2023.
However snippets of information gathered by radiogoldlive.com indicate that some senior government officials are bent on abrogating the current contract with GCNet so as to Ussher in UNIPASS which to the understanding of some players in the sector government will not be making any money except in the area of transit trade.
It has also gathered that contrary to information given by the promoters of UNIPASS that it has the latest technology to operate in Ghana’s ports, radiogolive.com is reliably informed that UNIPASS is expectant of latching on the existing superior technology of GCNet to deploy its services.
The imminent colossal judgment debt of the estimated 120 million dollars that will be incurred by the state if the GCNet contract is abrogated among others include the cost of demobilizing the company’s state of the art technological systems and physical infrastructure across the country.
This is likely to have dire consequences on existing employments at the ports and job opportunities in the area coupled with a likelihood slump on revenue generation at ports since the inception of GCNet operations have seen some significant shore up of revenue from 2002 till date.
Some stakeholders are worried over the current development since according to them if GCNet shuts down its system it will affect some state agencies such as the Ghana Immigration Service, Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority, Ghana National Fire Service whose back end services ride on the technological infrastructure of GCNet.
Meanwhile GCNet’s platform accounts for 95 per cent of the total revenue collected by GRA. In a day this platform collects GHc90 million. Records available indicate that the automation of the GCNet enabled GRA-Custom processes between 2003 and 2016 witnessed a revenue increase from GH¢2,492, 144, 65.42 in 2003 to GH¢13,160,942,845.48 in 2016.
On the domestic side, revenue improved since the deployment of the Total Revenue Integrated Processing Systems – trips – from GH¢3bn in 2012 to GH¢15.7bn in 2017.
Story: Henry George Martinson/radiogoldlive.com
