Road tax offenders could be fined: official

Vehicle owners who have not paid their road taxes could be fined by the Ministry of Economy and Finance later this month, an official at the ministry’s tax department said yesterday.

Om John, the department’s deputy director, said officials would begin searching for vehicle owners with outstanding taxes on October 21, one day after the deadline.

Collected annually, road taxes range from 4,500 riels (about US$1.05) for some motorbikes to more than 1 million riels ($238) for some cars. Fines are equivalent to double the tax payment.

“We will cooperate with the police and tax officials to check whether all the vehicles have paid the road tax or not,” Om John said. “And if they haven’t paid, we will fine them.”

Om John said approximately 90 percent of motorbike owners and 65 percent of car owners had paid the tax so far this year, figures he said marked an improvement over previous years. He declined to provide figures for last year.

“The payment of road taxes has been better this year than other years, because people seem to understand that it’s their duty,” he said.

The tax collection process has recently come under fire, however. The Affiliated Network for Social Accountability in East Asia and Pacific said last week that collection agents had forced some motorists to pay as much as US$1 million in excess charges. These allegations have been brought before the Anticorruption Unit.
(source from phnompenh post, Oct 4 2010)