Egypt's Parliament approves amendments to Unified Tax Law

CAIRO - 19 December 2022: The House of Representatives, under Speaker Hanafi Gebali, approved on Sunday the new amendments to the 2020 Unified Tax Procedures Law that were submitted by the government.

On December 6, the Parliament referred the amendments to the Budget and Planning Committee, the Office of the Constitutional Affairs, and the Economic Affairs Committee for review.

"The amendment complies with international agreements signed by Egypt and other countries that are members of the Global Forum for Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes," Gebali said on the new amendments.

In light of the amendments, a paragraph will be added to article 78 of the CBE law, which stipulates that articles 140 and 142 of CBE law on the secrecy of banking accounts will not prevent banks from exchanging secret information on the personal accounts of their clients in compliance with international tax agreements effective in Egypt.

The Finance Ministry has earlier dismissed groundless reports that the new amendment will breach the secrecy of the personal banking accounts of ordinary citizens.

The ministry stressed the new amendment is only concerned with the exchange of information approved by the international agreements effective in Egypt and is by no means related to disclosing information on personal accounts and deposits of citizens in Egyptian banks or divulging their industrial, commercial and professional secrets.

The Egyptian Government issued the Unified Tax Procedures Law No. 206 of 2020, amending certain articles of the income tax law, value added tax law, stamp tax, state development tax, and other similar taxes. The Unified Tax Procedures Law No. 206 became effective as of October 20, 2020.

In summary, the newly issued law aims to establish unified tax procedures for filing and regulating direct and indirect taxes. As such, taxpayers will have a single tax code for their tax registration for the different types of taxes.

The key issues addressed by the law involve filing of returns, financial penalties, rights and obligations of the Egyptian Tax Authority (ETA), and taxpayers as relevant to tax audit, appeal, refund, documentation retention, etc.