The Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA) in the company of two armed police officers on Friday morning raided Post Newspapers Limited offices along Bwinjimfumu Road over alleged unpaid taxes of over K16 million.
The officers who stormed the premises as early as 08:00 hours and served a warrant of distress on the newspaper for an amount of K6, 954,911.75, demanding that it be paid immediately also produced a demand notice of K9, 969,483.29, which ZRA claimed comprises Pay As You Earn, inclusive of penalties and interest.
The Post newspaper however denies it owes ZRA any such amounts on VAT and says there is an attempt to cook up figures and make it look as if The Post owes the ZRA a lot of money when it has paid over K40 million in taxes over the past 11 months.
According to the Finance General Manager Rowena Zulu, although the newspaper paid the K26 million ZRA had demanded, the newspaper had disagreements over the way the penalties and interest was calculated.
The newspaper is of the view that politics is at play in the matter and that Government was out to fix it and this was confirmed by the fact that the media was informed of the raid beforehand.
MISA Zambia National Director, Austin Kayanda and Sally Chiwama, Program Officer visited the newspaper and held talks to ascertain the fact on the ground with Post Managing Editor Joan Chirwa Ngoma in the company of News Editor Joseph Mwenda.
MISA Zambia is currently monitoring the situation and has since issued an alert.
