Stakeholders' consensus a must prior to imposition of RGST: LCCI

The Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) on Monday took a strong exception to the Chairperson National Assembly Standing Committee on Finance Fauzia Wahab for reluctantly and partially accepting the LCCI stance regarding inclusion of all the stakeholders in discussion on the issue of Reformed General Sales Tax.
"It would have been better if the Standing Committee on Finance had accepted the LCCI stance fully vis-à-vis, inclusion of all the stakeholders from trade and industry in the discussion on the issue of RGST with FBR." The LCCI President Shahzad Ali Malik stated this in a statement issued here. The Lahore Chamber has long-standing stance that imposition of RGST without taking all the stakeholders onboard will not be fruitful.
It was requested that a meeting between the LCCI, other stakeholders and the FBR was a must without which RGST was not acceptable. The same stance was also repeated at the National Assembly Standing Committee on Finance on Friday last wherein the representatives of all the Chambers of Commerce and other trade bodies were present.
The LCCI President did not react to these unwanted remarks of the Arif Aziz, one of the members of the Standing Committee from ruling party, only to avoid a controversy. It could have been damaging if an argument had started on the issue, he said and added that the rumpus caused due to exchange of hot words between a few members of the committee and the Chairperson Fauzia Wahab led to adjournment of the meeting inconclusively.
He alleged that the chairperson adjourned the meeting whenever she wanted and the same happened on last Friday wherein a large number of trade and industry representatives were also present.
Malik urged the government to take all the stakeholders including chambers of commerce onboard with talks with FBR as per the demand of the Lahore Chamber. It is pertinent to mention that the majority members in the National Assembly Standing Committee on Finance had already demanded the removal of the Chairperson of NA Standing Committee on Finance Fauzia Wahab.
The members said that chairperson did not allow other members to speak in the meeting. We have also submitted written demand to the Speaker National Assembly for her removal from the post and appoint someone else as chairperson of the committee" he maintained.