The Finance (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2016 ("the Bill") has been released for consultation and will be introduced in the Parliament next week. This draft legislation incorporates the measures announced by the Honourable Minister of Finance in his Budget Speech on 29 July 2016. Once approved by Parliament and the President of Mauritius, the legislation will come into force.

This alert covers the key tax measures contained in the Bill and the dates they become effective. Note that the Bill may be subject to changes following parliamentary debates.

You will recall that the Hon Minister of Finance announced that tax holidays will be provided to companies holding Treasury Management Licence, Overseas Family Corporation Licence, Global Headquarters Administration Licence as well as to Foreign Ultra High Net Worth Individuals investing a minimum of USD 25 Milllion in Mauritius. These highly awaited measures are, unfortunately, not included in the Bill. We expect that these tax holidays to be introduced through Regulations and that the conditions to be met in order to avail of the tax incentives will be clearly set out in the Regulations.

The Bill provides for amendment to the MRA Act for the introduction of an Alternative Dispute Resolution Panel (‘ATDR Panel’) that will independently review the assessments raised by MRA. Given the number of pending tax cases at the Assessment Review Committee (ARC) with the value of taxes involved being over Rs8bn as at December 2015, such a measure is welcomed. However, the Bill provides that the Panel shall comprise of two officers from MRA and one independent lawyer. We highly recommend that the composition of the Panel be reviewed to make it more independent from MRA.

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