Mahen Seeruttun: “Mauritius is not a harmful tax regime”

The global business sector has a new champion in the name of the Minister of Agro-Industry, Mahen Seeruttun, who vouched for the country’s reputation as a transparent financial centre. This speech comes at a time when the offshore sector is under strain following the revision of the DTAA with India. The Minister was speaking this week at the joint meeting of the ACP Council of Ministers and ACP Ministers of Foreign Affairs in Papua New Guinea. This meeting is a prelude to the 8th ACP Summit of Heads of States and Government held in Port Moresby, in Papua New Guinea. The Minister of Agro-Industry dedicated nearly half of his speech to defending the Mauritian global business sector. “Mauritius is neither a non-cooperative tax jurisdiction nor a harmful tax regime. Besides, the OECD officially rates Mauritius as a largely compliant jurisdiction in the Peer Reviews conducted by its Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information,” he stressed out. Regarding the list of 30 countries branded as non-cooperative tax jurisdictions by the EU, the Minister stated that “the blacklist continues to unjustifiably and misleadingly comprise some ACP States, including Mauritius, which are mostly service-driven economies.” Mahen Seeruttun added that after two reviews carried out by the European Commission, none of the ACP States concerned has been de-listed despite the fact that many of them no longer meet the criterion of being included in the national list of at least 10 EU Member States. While the said blacklist has been withdrawn from the Commission’s website, it now appears in an interactive map in the same website. “Apart from the damage it is inflicting on Mauritius, which wants to make its financial services industry the main pillar of its economy, the EU blacklist continues to cast a doubt on the reputation of our jurisdiction. This goes contrary to the spirit of ACP-EU partnership,” he strongly underlined.

Economic Partnership

Mauritius, he stated, values Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA) as development instruments which can bring benefits such as employment generation, greater trade, enhanced productive capacity and regional integration. The Minister also called for additional EU resources and the setting up of special EPA Funds, while also increasing aid for trade financing. The Eastern and Southern Africa, at its last Ministerial Council meeting in December 2015 in Lusaka, Zambia, agreed that countries which have prepared their market access offers should urgently proceed to negotiate the deepening and broadening of the interim EPA (IEPA) and other ESA members can join in once they are ready. “There seems to be a lack of clarity on the terms “deepening” and “broadening”. For Mauritius, deepening means improving the interim Economic Partnership Economic Agreement (for example, in the areas of rules of origin) and broadening means adding new chapters to the IEPA, so that the IEPA becomes a full and comprehensive EPA as is case for other geographical configurations,” said Minister Seeruttun. The ESA Council also decided to request the convening of a joint ESA EU ministerial meeting to provide guidance to the negotiators, especially as regards the establishment of roadmap for the conclusion of the negotiations on a full and comprehensive EPA. “We firmly believe that the Joint Undertaking has many merits,” said the Minister of Agro-Industry. Once it comes into effect, the instrument will establish an enabling environment for enhancing intra-ACP and ACP-EU trade and facilitating regional value chain. It can also be used as a template for similar agreements to be negotiated on a bilateral basis by ACP countries/regions with certain non-ACP countries. “As an export driven economy, Mauritius looks forward to deriving optimal benefits from the Joint Undertaking. We, therefore, encourage ACP countries to sign the Joint Undertaking with a view to ensuring its early entry into force,” added the Minister.