IRC wants staff to follow code of conduct, be disciplined

The Internal Revenue Commission (IRC) has well-established disciplinary procedures to deal with negative staff behaviour and conduct that affect their employment, Commissioner Dr Alois Daton says.
He was clarifying IRC’s position regarding a newspaper article last December about the sacking of some employees.
Daton said there were 23 staff disciplined and terminated, and not 28 as reported.
All 23 staff went through the disciplinary process.
“A thorough investigative process is activated and staff are allowed the benefit of defending themselves before a final decision is taken, regarding allegations concerning an employee’s bad behaviour and malfeasance,” Daton said.
“We are very strict about how people operate in this organisation.
“When we recruit people, we put them through an induction programme.We also give them a code of conduct.
“Code of conduct basically states how our staff will behave.
“We have a zero-tolerance policy against fraud and corruption – something we are totally against.
“Because of fraud and corruption, our people have colluded with tax payers, reduced tax liability of tax payers and done things that are against code of conduct.”
Daton said they dismissed several staff last year.
“We terminated a number of staff who were involved in fraud and corruption,” he said.
“We maintain the policy that we are going to be a corruption-free organisation.
“Anyone who works for us who misbehaves or is involved in issues like that: IRC has no place for people like that.
“We want this organisation to be corruption-free because we are here to raise revenue for the Government.
“People like that can basically put a stop to how much we can bring in for the Government in terms of revenue.”
Daton said there were disciplinary processes in which investigators thoroughly investigated staff involved in fraud and corruption matters.
“We investigate those matters, we interview people, we get reports,” he said.
“It is based on that process that we make decisions.
“During that process, our people are given the opportunity to come back and not so much appeal but provide a statement to defend (themselves from) the allegations.
“That’s the process we follow.”