The National Treasury is putting out comprehensive tax reform proposals that will give the taxman unrestricted access to Kenyans' data, including real-time financial transactions made with mobile money.
One of the most important suggestions in the ministry's drafted medium-term debt strategy is an exemption from data protection laws for the Kenya Revenue Authority.
The government is recommending changing the Data Protection Act of 2019 to exempt KRA from its restrictions in order to facilitate easy access to information in order to accomplish this.
Currently, the legislation stipulates that information about family or private affairs can only be requested when a legitimate justification is given.
The data law also stipulates that a data controller or processor must obtain personal information from the data subject directly.
With the proposed changes, KRA will no longer be subject to these restrictions and be allowed unrestricted access to any data for the purpose of enforcing revenue collection.
The National Treasury suggests integrating at least three systems to increase tax revenue collection by widening the net.
Systems for the interconnected Population Registry and tax administration will be interconnected.
As a result, KRA will have immediate access to birth and death records in an effort to stop tax fraud linked to fake deaths.
Additionally, banks and telecommunications firms will be integrated with the tax administration systems.
This would imply that KRA would be able to track the transfer of money in both personal and business accounts in real time.
In an effort to identify Kenyan incomes through digital platforms as well, KRA will track M-Pesa and Airtel Money transfers as well.
To ensure prompt tax collection at source, the taxman will now be able to track money transmitted to specific mobile money wallets.
The government suggests that the tax administration systems be integrated with the betting and gaming systems in an effort to hasten tax collection within the gambling industry.
The goal is to ensure that gaming and betting taxes are remitted in real-time.
''This will allow seamless access to information for a complete view of the taxpayers' economic transactions through big data analytics to drive compliance,'' the draft debt strategy paper reads.
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