Q&A | Patrick Kabagambe | Conveyancing, Immigration

[music] my name is Patrick Kavagam. I am a partner at Viruni Bar and Associates. Been here by for about 18 years but the law firm has been in practice for at least 23 years. We are based in [clears throat] Uganda specifically Campala and Uganda is in East Africa.

specialtity I’ll just pick out two areas we do a number of things but specialtity one is tax practice that includes tax advisory services that is really tax planning and then tax litigation where disputes arise between taxpayers and the the revenue authority and that involve us litigating at the tax appeals tribunal that’s a specialized court for tax areas in Uganda second area of specialtity is immigration. I support clients who have foreign employees and we have them work in Uganda. So we I I handle specifically

applying and processing work permits multiple entry visas getting for those who have stayed here longer and wish to be citizens citizenship it is it yeah so that’s it for question one. We are one-stop center focusing especially on tax services. we do tax advisory that would be tax planning where mostly either they are startup companies or those that have not had good tax planning and they come and and and get tax advice prior tax planning basically. Now during the their services we do because we are tax registered

agents with revenue authority. So we handle filing their tax returns and advising them on their dayto-day basis. In the event that a dispute arises we also represent these clients the tax appeals tribunal. So at Bartan Associates you have both tax planning or tax advisory which goes into accountancy really and also tax advisory in terms of litigation. So you don’t have to have an accountant on one hand and then bring us matter when a dispute arises. Here we have everything in one at one address. That’s what I find

unique about our our service. types of clients. I’ll I’ll I’ll I’ll break them into two. We have what you’d call really non litigation and and litigation. Under non litigation, we do most of advisory that can be it includes local clients and also international clients. We have had engagements where advised revenue authorities countries that wish to to benchmark and pick a leaf or two from our system. So we have advised the the revenue authority of Liberia. We have done work with Malawi.

that is for international clients. We have now that is for nano litigation. Now some of these matters of course cross into litigation. It includes local international clients. We have clients who have who are branches of international international clients and where districts are cross borders. So so so so we do litigation also for such matters which includes us collaborating with revenue authorities of other countries to get information because much as we may have cross-border transactions where when a dispute arises in Uganda it’s handled in Uganda so

there’s consultancy where we do mostly opinions and advisory and the litigation that handles us that requires us to handle litigation some of it is for local clients. Some of it is for clients that have branches here and other countries and they they engage us to do their litigation. Yes.

What comes my mind as highlights in our tax practice the issue has always been the 30% for taxpayers to pay 30%. Now our law firm has has handled two major cases that I think are major highlights for all taxpayers. One, we handled a case of a case of opimak which was basically a constitutional case to test the conality of the requirement to pay 30% before you take a matter to tax appeals to we litigated this case until the highest court which found yes it is

unfair but it is constitutional and and it set it set a precedent. We were proud to have handled the case and it it it settled the matter of the requirement to pay 30%. However, we handled a second case which now highlighted a few areas where you may not be required to pay the 30% and for matters that don’t have strict assessments figures which just if you agreed with the decision of the tax authority which doesn’t include a tax assessment per se. Now that one created a breather for taxpayers and also

created clearly ambiguity that it is not a given that when you get a tax dispute you have to go because some some disputes are in huge amounts and 30% becomes such a cumbersome problem for you to take this matter. So our those two cases one up versus ato set it clear that 30% requirement where the second case it’s called Johnny managa versus attorney which created some exceptions where you don’t have to pay 30%. So for me those two cases were highlight and and they created a a a

basis for all taxpayers to know where you fall and also to know that there’s a breather. It is not mandatory for you to pay that money. That’s what comes to my mind. [music] We’re not a global village and really it doesn’t matter where a dispute arises.

we do we have clients who do businesses here and abroad and vice versa. So for us it was about a platform where we can be found and find our peers. So so so there are many platforms but for global experts the the major thing was the review and the approval by our peers because we consider ourselves experts here and and and we found no better place to to join to look for our peers but also to know that there’s approval of our peers also also we have

found the the number of updates on global law experts I get updates regularly from colleagues who write articles from so countries updating what’s the new things in their country which at some point will be relevant to us. So it was really that reason why we decided to join global installs.