“You are charged only because you are an owner”
Four years after the introduction of the “National Residential Property Tax” (NRPT), you are going to the Privy Council to contest this tax?
We contested the NRPT as soon as the Finance Bill introduced this tax but the procedures took a long time. It’s when the Supreme Court rejected all our requests to go to the Privy Council that we had to undertake our own procedures.
So, as I understand, the Supreme Court refuses to listen to the case?
The court found that the complainants did not had enough grounds to go against the tax as they did not have a delocus standi. They also said that in Mauritius, there is not what we call the public interest litigation. We, we assume that this is not public interest litigation and even if it was the case, why not ?
Anyway, the complainants pay the tax, don’t they?
In fact, and this is why they assume that the imposed tax is unjust. Furthermore, you should know that when the tax was implemented, people called it the Navin Ramgoolam Property Tax. In fact, at that time, neither the houses were taxed, nor wasteland. It is only afterwards that we decided to bring the case to court that the Government decided to exclude the wastelands.
Let’s get back to the Supreme Court. First of all, it refuses to listen to your case. You request to go to the Privy Council, they don’t grant the permission and then, you go directly?
Yes, but I which to precise that the court said that maybe if we presented our request on another ground, it would have granted us the permission to go to the Privy Council, but I didn’t want to. Then, the question I asked to the Privy Council was: if as a tax-payer I had the right to contest the legality of any tax if I estimated that it was unjust?
And why do you think that it is unjust?
Because the Constitution grants us the right to property. When you buy a land parcel, you pay all the registration fees and others; you become owner of the parcel. The Government passes a law to state that your land parcel is not yours anymore but became a national property.
But don’t we already pay the municipal tax?
We pay the municipal tax in exchange of services given by the municipality. It provides waste disposal, roads reparation, etc… When a service is provided, it is normal that we pay for it. You are not being charged only because you are a land owner! Do you know how much sacrifices people had to do to be able to buy a house? This tax is crushing the middle class, the working class and you know very well who are those people: Hindus, Muslims and Chinese who are working hard.
The capital also pays the NRPT!
Yes the capital pays but at the same time at which there are land taxes, the taxes paid by the NRPT are reduced. The Corporate Tax goes from 35% to 15%.
Yes but the Minister of Finances did that to attract investments.
What I know is that they say to be willing to democratize the economy, but, in fact, they are capitalizing the capital!
But they pay the NRPT as well.
I am speaking about the Corporate Tax. It is the same problem, whatsoever tax must be fair and reasonable. You cannot be charged only because you are an owner.
