Government Faces Questions on Collecting Gaming Tax Arrears

The government’s long-running tax dispute with one of Belize’s biggest gaming operators may have reached a turning point. After the High Court dismissed a challenge brought by businessman Kim Wai Chee and two Brads gaming companies over millions of dollars in tax assessments linked to Boledo and Jackpot operations, attention is now shifting to what happens next. With Justice Nadine Nabie ruling that the claim was misconceived and an abuse of the court’s process, the question is whether the government will now move to collect any outstanding taxes. Today, we put that question directly to Prime Minister John Briceño and asked whether any directive will be issued following the court’s decision.

 

Prime Minister John Briceño

“Well there is no such directive, certainly not from the political directive. But the Belize Tax Service has a responsibility to collect the necessary taxes. What happened din that instance is that when we as a government was taking a look at the agreement we signed, a number of clauses in the agreement were not being met. We brought it to their attention that they needed to comply. We gave them about two years to comply. In one of them the tax service realized that they were not complying with business tax, then as mandated by law they did an assessment to the Brads Boledo company and it had nothing to do with any political directive. It is simply that when we reviewed the contract, there were some things they were not complying with and one of those things was the business tax.”

 

Justice Nadine Nabie found that Chee and Brads Gaming had the right to bring the claim, but ruled they went to court too soon. Instead of using the review process set out under the Tax Administration and Procedure Act, they bypassed it and filed directly with the court.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

Watch the full newscast here: