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Saturday, July 12, 2025

Couva Point Lisas Chamber wants tax deferrals to cope with loss of business

by

SHASTRI BOODAN
1942 days ago
20200317
The Couva Point Lisas Chamber of Commerce (CPLCC) says the business community could go under unless the Government extends a helping hand, during this COVID-19 crisis.

The Couva Point Lisas Chamber of Commerce (CPLCC) says the business community could go under unless the Government extends a helping hand, during this COVID-19 crisis.

GUARDIAN

The Cou­va Point Lisas Cham­ber of Com­merce (CPLCC) wants Gov­ern­ment to give the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty some fi­nan­cial breaks dur­ing this time of the COVID-19 cri­sis.

CPLCC head, Ram­c­hand Ra­jbal Maraj, told Guardian Me­dia that while the CPLCC is hap­py with moves made by the gov­ern­ment to re­duce the spread of the COVID19 Virus, the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty could go un­der un­less the gov­ern­ment ex­tends a help­ing hand.

He said the gov­ern­ment should move the April 30 dead­line for the fil­ing of tax­es to a date at least 3 months lat­er on the cal­en­dar. Ra­jbal Maraj al­so sug­gests the pay­ment of the Green Fund, VAT, ad­di­tion­al tax­es and util­i­ty bills should be de­ferred for at least at least 3 months, so busi­ness­es can re­cov­er. Ac­cord­ing to Mr Maraj, many busi­ness have to foot util­i­ty bills for elec­tric­i­ty, wa­ter and phones and sim­ply won’t have the mon­ey.

The CPLCC head says they al­so are seek­ing a low­er rate of in­ter­est on cred­it cards, in­ter­est on loans and over­drafts.

He said the gov­ern­ment should start seek­ing as­sis­tance from the In­ter­na­tion­al Mon­e­tary Fund and oth­er re­lat­ed fi­nan­cial in­sti­tu­tions to en­sure there is no crash in the fi­nan­cial sys­tem.

“The gov­ern­ment must show some flex­i­bil­i­ty when it comes to pay­ing tax­es and if not, they have to jus­ti­fy small and medi­um busi­ness­es go­ing un­der,” he ar­gues.

Ra­jbal Maraj said he wants the gov­ern­ment to guar­an­tee an ad­e­quate sup­ply of food, wa­ter and med­i­cines in this coun­try. He al­so wants the au­thor­i­ties to give more in­for­ma­tion on the COVID-19 Virus and es­tab­lish a ded­i­cat­ed in­for­ma­tion hot­line.

He al­so told Guardian Me­dia that he was dis­sat­is­fied that the Cou­va/Tabaquite/Tal­paro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion does not have a Prin­ci­pal Med­ical Of­fi­cer, and has not had one to guide the coun­cil for the past 3 months.

He says this must be rec­ti­fied quick­ly, giv­en the cur­rent COVID-19 cri­sis.


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