The President’s Office has forwarded a list of 30 bills the government intends to submit to the Parliament of the Maldives in the last session of the year.
The bills include the controversial Tax Amendment Bill, the Judiciary Amendment Bill, the Criminal Procedure Act Amendment Bill, the Maldives Health Service Bill, the Hajj and Umrah Bill, the Foreign Investment Bill, and the Compensation for Defamation.
Government has planned to hike the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and Tourism Goods and Services Tax (TGST) to increase state revenue via the Tax Amendment Bill. The Ministry of Finance has stated the government decided to implement tax hikes in response to changes in the global market and in accordance with the current economic situation, which threatens to become worse if no measures are taken. As such, the government will be decreasing expenditure and implementing a variety of measures to increase state revenue, including increasing TGST from 12% to 16% and increasing GST from 6% to 8%. The changes are proposed to be implemented in January 2023.
The last session for 2022 convened on August 18 and will conclude in November.
