The State Minister for Finance in charge of Planning David Bahati says government is final stages of blocking Virtual Private Networks (VPN) that several Ugandans have installed on their mobile gadgets in a bid to dodge government’s social media tax.
Bahati says the technology that creates a safe and encrypted connection over a less secure network, such as the internet is partly responsible for the low revenue less than what was projected at the start of the financial year.
Government introduced a Shs200 daily social media tax forcing some Ugandans to resort to VPN.
The social media tax was approved and passed by parliament for the Financial years 2018/2019 and as of yesterday 1st/July, access to internet was limited to users who have paid the 200 shillings via their mobile money accounts.
Meanwhile Bahati calls for calm from mobile money users that soon the Excise Duty (Amendment) Bill 2018 will be gazetted to become operational following the president’s assent to it.
