Success Stories

Public Private Dialogue in BURERA District

> 11 August 2015

Public Private Dialogue in BURERA District
Before 24th February 2015, business people in Burera District were complaining about being affected by penalties coming from ignorance of law driving taxes established by RRA.
Therefore, a dialogue was organized around this issue and brought together the district authorities, RRA representatives at Provincial level and district level, business community representatives coming from 17 sectors and other opinion leaders in business activities. At the end, the following resolutions were taken: organize a training seminar on laws and regulations of taxes fees, identify categories of business people to attend the seminar, to do an effective mobilization of paying taxes and fees after being registered and getting TIN number and return the whole documents to RRA office when they do not their daily business activities.
Two months and half later, an RPPD MEETS COMMUNITY was held in the said district and the purpose was to appreciate or to criticize the RPPD Mechanism for organizing the dialogue on the burning issues in commercial sector. Both sides (RRA and business people) and the district were the first to praise the fruits of dialogues. The concretes examples were the following: The training happened from 16th to 19th March 2015 at 3 sites: Cyanika with 73 out of 80 ie 91%, Kirambo with 72 out of 80 ie 90% and Kivuye with 37 out of 40 ie 92%. This shows that the training was needed, said Charles BUCYANAYANDI, PSF representative at Kagogo sector. This was emphasized by HABIYAREMYE J. De Dieu in charge of business development service, after reading the report given by RRA at district and provincial levels that indicates the impact of dialogues on the business climate. There is an increased rate of taxes payers during the last semester. Concretely, from 24th March 2015:
246 out of 261 are doing declaration of their benefits
9 new businesses got their TIN number
3 business people were advised on how to register their business
And one business was closed
There is still a need to continue effective mobilization of paying taxes and fees. According to TWIZERIMANA Vestine, representing RRA at district level, remarquable changes were registered in the past two years, the figures of taxes and fees patente, rental income taxes & fixed asset tax shows a significant increase:

• Mars 2014: Mars 2015
• Total collection= 40,677,647frw Total collection= 62,718,084frw Business people, district authorities appreciated the mechanism, especially the fact that resolutions were jointly taken by concerned parties and the spirit that marked the dialogue stakeholders in taking resolutions which satisfy both sides and the follow up on the implementation process. Reported by Hyacinthe TWISHIME, RPPD Consultant allocated in Burera district.