MOST Chinese and Indian businesses operating from downtown are said to be unregistered and evading taxes.
VENERANDA LANGA
The issue was revealed by Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) Association founder and executive officer Farai Mutambanengwe while giving oral evidence before the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Small and Medium Enterprises chaired by Zanu PF Gokwe MP Dorothy Mhangami.
Mutambanengwe told the committee that the SMEs sector suffered from lack of State support in that government spending in the local economy was low, as well as non-payment by the government and large corporations to SMEs. He said the SMEs sector was also worried that since independence there had not been initiatives to encourage SMEs to be formalised.
“Since independence there has not been a sustained, broad-based initiative to encourage SMEs to come into the formal sector, but the sector has always been approached like an ‘illegitimate child’ in the sense that whenever there is big news about it, it is about one blitz or another,” said Mutambanengwe.
“One also finds that a lot of Chinese and Indian players in the SMEs sector are not registered for tax purposes and Zimra cannot claim their input VAT taxes – and yet our businesses are being pushed out of business because they are trying to comply with Zimra requirements,” he said.
Mutambanengwe said the SMEs sector was sidelined in accessing contracts and loans from big banks.
“There is non-payment of monies owed by government and large corporatons and we receive payments late, and sometimes we do not receive payments at all after having supplied products or services. A high percentage of SMEs reported they were unable to access contracts or supplies from white-owned businesses, especially in the leather industry and construction industry,” he said.
