Report reveals tax details of parliamentarians

ISLAMABAD: Only five lawmakers have paid 60% of the total amount paid by members of the lower and upper houses of parliament in taxes.

Making maters more interesting, the Tax Directory 2018, which the government has released ater a delay of almost one and half years, also reveals that dozens of MPS did not even submit their income tax returns to the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) for that year.

Former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi’s returns were 8,000% higher than the previous year and also equal to 30% of the total taxes paid by all members of parliament.

The tax returns of Prime Minister Imran

Khan also jumped by 172% to Rs282,449 in 2018 in comparison with the previous year.

As a tax year starts on July 1 and ends on June 30, the figures were submited during the first year of the government.

The figures show that tax contributions of the parliamentarians are constantly increasing since the launch of the first edition seven years ago.

However, they remain below potential given the lawmakers’ lifestyles.

Of the 401 National Assembly and Senate members, who submited their income tax returns for 2018, 70 paid more than Rs1 million.

But ater excluding the top five taxpayers who paid almost 60% of the total taxes, the payments by the remaining 396 members are very low.

Adviser to the Prime Minister on Finance Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh said 401 MPS submited their income tax returns for the year 2018 and paid Rs800 million.

Abbasi said that the abnormal jump in his tax liabilities was because of the change in the shareholding of the Airblue company.

The second highest amount in taxes — Rs140 million — was paid by Najeeb Haroon, followed by Rs35 million by Law Minister Barrister Farogh Nasim, Rs29.2 million by Senator Talha Mehmood and Rs28.2 million by Senator Taj Afridi. Excluding these top five taxpayers, the remaining members of parliament paid Rs326 million.

At least four federal ministers and ministers of state paid not a single penny as tax. They included Zartaj Gul, Faisal Vawda, Sahibzada Mehboob Sultan and Shabbir Ali.

Besides, a total of fity-three senators and members of the National Assembly (MNAS) paid no tax during this period. Zubaida Jalal’s name didn’t appear in the directory.