VietNamNet Bridge - Provincial authorities have not been able to revoke the investment certificate granted to the Canadian gold miner Besra because of administrative procedures, according to the Le Phuoc Hoai Bao, Director of the Quang Nam provincial Planning and Investment Department.

The Quang Nam provincial Taxation Agency has sent a dispatch to the provincial people’s committee proposing to apply coercive tax payment measures to Besra by taking back the investment certificate.

Besra, which runs the Bong Mieu and Phuoc Son Gold Companies, has been named in the provincial taxation agency’s blacklist because it still has not paid VND400 billion in tax.

The head of the tax agency Ngo Bon, in the dispatch, reported that despite many measures applied since 2014, the tax body still cannot collect the tax sum. 

Therefore, he has proposed taking back the investment certificate granted before to Phuoc Son and Bong Mieu in accordance with current laws.

However, Director of the Quang Nam provincial Planning and Investment Department Le Phuoc Hoai Bao, said this cannot happen. 

The Article No 48 of the 2014 Investment Law stipulates that investment certificates will be revoked in eight cases. Meanwhile, Phuoc Son Gold Company does not belong to any of the cases.

Phuoc Son Gold Company got the investment license No 2355 dated October 20, 2003 from the Ministry of Planning & Investment and got the investment certificate No 331022000010 dated July 8, 2008 from the Quang Nam provincial People’s Committee as a gold and minerals exploitation & processing company. The provincial taxation agency granted a tax code to it in November 2003.

Under the current law, the dissolution of businesses needs to be done as follows: the business registration body reports the status of the enterprises which are following formalities to be dissolved on the national information portal, along with releasing the decision on revoking business registration certificate. The decision on certificate revocation must be made public.

Phuoc Son operates under the investment law and its investment certificate is also a business registration certificate. In principle, the two kinds of documents must be separate, but the company has not followed the procedures to do this.

As a result, Phuoc Son’s status still cannot be reported on the national information portal.

Sources said that Besra is planning to restructure Phuoc Son and Bong Mieu and Viet A Commercial Bank is considering taking over the two gold companies.

By the end of May, the total tax arrears of the two gold companies was over VND384 billion, including more than VND296 billion of Phuoc Son and VND88 billion of Bong Mieu. They both have not presented any measure or commitment on payment of the tax debt.

Dat Viet