City to take action against only five tax evaders
City to take action against only five tax evaders
Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The Jakarta administration issued distress orders on Tuesday for
only five of more than 600 tax evaders, including hotels,
restaurants and entertainment centers, to force them to pay their
tax arrears in 16 days.
The issuance of the orders was announced by Ma'mun Amin, an
assistant to the city secretary for financial affairs, during a
hearing with the City Council's Commission C for financial
affairs.
The orders were sent to the Omni Batavia Hotel, Sano Hotel,
Nusantara Hotel, American Chillis restaurant and Pondok Laut
restaurant.
Out of the five, Omni Batavia is the largest tax evader, with
its tax arrears valued at Rp 1.62 billion, which also makes it
one of the top five among the more than 600 tax evaders.
Meanwhile, the Sano Hotel owes Rp 1.02 billion, Nusantara
Hotel Rp 67.62, American Chillis Rp 465 million and Pondok Laut
Restaurant Rp 106 million.
However, the other four top five evaders -- the Sahid Jaya
Hotel with tax arrears of Rp 13.27 billion, Dunkin Donuts
restaurant (Rp 4.37 billion), the Park Plaza Hotel (Rp 2.57
billion), and the Orchid Hotel (Rp 2.37 billion) -- were not
issued with distress orders.
City revenue agency head Deden Supriadi, who attended
Tuesday's hearing, declined to explain why only five tax evaders
had been targeted.
He argued that his office had to go through the correct
procedures before issuing distress orders against tax evaders.
Deden vowed, however, to slap such orders on other tax evaders
immediately after all the requirements had been met. Again, he
refused to explain what these requirements might be.
On Monday, he said his office would issue distress orders on
July 1 against all tax evaders whose arrears between 1987 and May
2003 amounted to over Rp 58 billion.
Why Deden should need more time to issue such orders is
something of a mystery given that the evaders have been refusing
to pay their taxes for such a remarkably long time.
Under the current rules, the city revenue agency has
sufficient legal grounds to immediately take action against these
tax evaders.
Based on Bylaw No. 4/2002 on local taxes, an evader must pay
his tax arrears within 37 days after he receives a first demand
from the agency. If he ignores this demand, the agency should
send a second demand, 21 days after which the taxes must be paid.
If this second demand is ignored, the agency should issue a
distress order to force the evader to pay his arrears within 16
days, after which time his assets may be seized. These assets may
then be auctioned after a further 14 days.
During the hearing, a number of councillors blasted the city
revenue agency for its reluctance to take action against the tax
evaders.
Suyatno, a member of commission C, urged the restaurants,
hotels, entertainment centers and other evaders to immediately
pay their arrears as they had already collected the taxes from
their customers.
"Therefore, there is no reason for the businessmen not to pay
the tax to the city administration," he argued.