TIRANA, March. 2 – After PM Rama announced the new capital amnesty on Monday, the Minister of Finance, Anila Denaj, stated the initiative will affect the banking system the most after its implementation.
“The banking sector is the one that will feel [the impact] the most. You already know that as of January 2018, the banking sector works only with financial statements and there is a stalemate between these statements and the real situation. So we believe it will give ‘breathing space’ for loans. ” Regarding the fees that will be applied, Denaj said the numbers are still being discussed, but all that can be said right now is that levels will be low enough to allow everyone to declare their assets.
“This initiative aims to complement another aspect towards the formalization of the economy, which has already begun with the fiscal reforms. This is a process that has not started yet, has been discussed with our expert groups for some time and will be given as a proposal to the groups of interest very soon. The details will be part of the discussion as the first draft is published”, Denaj added.
However not all ‘cash’ will be part of the amnesty. The Minister of Finance explained that the source of income can be verified through a wide range of information exchange, while all criteria and instruments that will be used to monitor income and their declarations will be filtered.
“The criteria to be determined and the instruments which will be used to monitor their income and declaration will certainly pass through all filters, whether by all organizations set up for this service or a wide range of information. If it is found that this money comes from illegal activity, it will be seized, but this will not be the first step. The first step will be to evaluate all the asset declarations one has made in accordance with the job statement, in Albania or abroad, and to evaluate those years of work based on the income they have received in each country they claim to have worked in,” Denaj said to News 24.
This is the first time Albania intends to implement a full fiscal amnesty. In 2011, the DP government attempted to implement a capital amnesty, but the law ended in fiscal amnesty instead as the opposition did not provide the votes needed to change the penal code, which condemns evasion. Consequently businesses and individuals were reluctant to declare their assets, as they could be prosecuted.
With this initiative citizens are supposedly forgiven all their liabilities as a result of not declaring their assets due to informal work. Non-declaration of assets is legally considered as an act of offense, as the individual has concealed the property and has not paid the 15 percent income tax, but through the capital amnesty individuals will not be prosecuted.
