A leading cellular phone firm Vodacom Tanzania paid a total of 36.5bn/- in corporate tax in the 2012/2013 financial year.The Managing Director of Vodacom Tanzania, Rene Meza said in a statement issued in Dar es Salaam that the company paid a total of 36.5bn/- , an increase of more than twenty times what the company paid over the last three financial years.
“We have been making steady investment in the business over the last few years and are now reaping the results of the investment hence our increased ability to make a bigger contribution to government revenue,” the Managing Director is quoted in the statement.
Other taxes that the company collected in 2012 amount to 190.75bn/-, the statement further said. He said a total of 4.56bn/- were paid as withholding tax, a total of 92.32bn/- as VAT.
Vodacom also paid a total of 51.33bn/- as Excise Duty and a total of 4.53bn/- in Regulatory Fees.
The company paid 2.57bn/- as the Universal Communications Services Access Fund Levy for 2012, he said.
Meza says other taxes and levies totally 34bn/- that his company paid in its’ just ended financial year include: Numbering Fees, Customs and Excise, Income Tax, Service Levy and Spectrum Fees.
On how much Vodacom had invested in the country in 2012, Meza says his company invested over 200bn/- in the 2012/13 financial year and that this had allowed his company to double the size of its network as at the end of March 2013.
Vodacom has invested in excess over 1.3tr/- in the country since its launch in 2000.
He goes on to says that Vodacom fully supports government efforts to ensure that as many Tanzanians as possible have improved access to telecommunications services.
Vodacom’s continued investment in its 3G networks and connection to the National Information Communication Technology Broadband Backbone (NICTBB) is a clear illustration of its commitment to this initiative, he says.
Vodacom invested 800bn/- in the NICTBB project last year when it connected its northern optic fibre ring for instance Dar-Arusha- Dodoma to the NICTBB . “Connection to the NICTBB coupled with our investment in 3G allows our customers to enjoy faster data speeds compared to what they had in the past.
This is a great achievement in the telecommunications sector as we all work towards the provision of broadband access to all Tanzanians. For, increased access to mobile broadband services will in turn play a major role in the social and economic growth of the country,” says Meza.
He goes on to say that,“ ..we are currently working on connecting our Western region (Mwanza, Mara, Kagera, Shinyanga, Tabora, Singida, Kigoma, Makambako) and Southern region (Morogoro, Coast, Iringa, Ruvuma, Mtwara, Lindi and Dar es Salaam) to the NICT backbone.
In addition to investing in 3G technology last year, Vodacom successfully launched an LTE trial network on Msasani Peninsular in Dar es salaam. This state of the art technology also known as 4G technology allows users to access the fastest possible data speeds in the country today.
Meza further says that Vodacom Tanzania prides itself on the work that it continues to do in the CSR arena. In 2012, the company through its corporate giving arm – the Vodacom Foundation - spent 9.6 bn/- on health, education and economic empowerment initiatives in the country.
The Vodacom Foundation has supported over 120 projects to date, ranging from fundraising for the awareness and eradication of fistula in Tanzania, the provision of teaching facilities to schools, the economic empowerment of women in rural areas to the provision of water to communities in semi-arid areas.
Vodacom Tanzania is a subsidiary company of Vodacom Group (Pty) Limited, South Africa, which is also a subsidiary of Vodafone Group UK.
Source: The Daily News, reported from Dar es Salaam
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