Collection of foreigner tax gets support

JAKARTA (JP): City councilors have hailed the city administration's ongoing operation to collect overdue foreigner taxes from expatriates in the city, suggesting that such an operation should be expanded into other sectors.

Helmy AR Syihab, chairman of the council's Commission C which is in charge of financial affairs, said yesterday that the city administration should also take action against those who evade taxes if the city wants to reach regional revenue targets.

The operation, which got underway on Sept. 25 and is scheduled to last through Oct. 10, is being conducted by an integrated team involving officials from the City Revenue Office, the City Immigration Office, the City Manpower Office, the Jakarta Office of the Investment Coordinating Agency, the city police and the Jakarta military command.

H. Wahab Rachmatsyah, the head of the City Revenue Office, said that the operation was prompted by the high level of unpaid foreigner taxes from 1992 and 1994.

He said the total value of the overdue taxes in the two-year period stands around Rp 2 billion (US$909,090).

The operation is also aimed at updating the city's data on the number of expatriates living in Jakarta.

In December 1994, there were 49,476 expatriates living in the city, reported Ibrahim Saleh, an official at the office.

Helmy said that despite the city administration's commitment to enhancing its annual revenues, the city did not change the foreigner tax target for the fiscal years of 1994/1995 and 1995/1996.

The target has been maintained at Rp 3 billion, he said.

However, he declined to say if the unchanged target was due to the failure of the city administration to reach last year's tax target.

In a related development, Mansyur Achmad, a councilor from the Golkar faction, said the operation should be conducted consistently and simultaneously in the city's five mayoralties, the Antara news agency reported.

He said the city should have accurate data on the number of expatriates residing in the capital in order to facilitate tax collection.

He urged the city administration to hold more operations to help prevent foreigners from entering the city illegally. (32)