Oman State Council, Shura to hold joint session today

Muscat: In response to the Royal orders by His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said, a joint session of the State Council and the Shura Council will be held today to discuss the draft of the “Selective Goods Tax Law”.
The decision was issued after disagreement arose between the State and Shura councils concerning the law referred by the Council of Ministers.
In preparation for today’s meeting, each council held individual meetings on Monday to discuss the articles of disagreement and the additions to the proposed tax.
During the Shura Council meeting, Saleh bin Said Masan, Chairman of the Economic and Financial Committee at the Council, presented the five articles of the “Selective Commodity Tax Law” for a further discussion.
This came during the first ordinary session of the fourth annual session (2018-2019) of the eighth period (2015-2019), which was presided over by Khalid bin Hilal Al Ma’awali, Chairman of Majlis Al Shura.
Al Mawali said, “We started our annual session with the briefing of the public budget draft for the fiscal year 2019, draft laws and agreements referred by the Council of Ministers. We also discussed the disagreements on the Selective Goods Tax Law articles that the State Council has decided to add to the draft law.”
Similarly, Dr. Yahya bin Mahfoudh Al Mantheri, Chairman of the State Council chaired the first regular session of the fourth sitting of the sixth term (2015-2019) of Oman’s State Council on Monday.
During the meeting, the council approved the proposal for the “Development of the regulation of private training institutions”.
The council also approved a proposal to establish two special committees to study “Enhancing the use of manpower in the public sector” and a proposal to study the “Promulgation of a law to regulate the application of biotechnology and its products and the protection of genetic data in the Sultanate”.
Subsequently, the council discussed the articles bearing disagreement in the draft law of the “Selective Goods Tax Law” transferred by the Council of Ministers and the report of the Joint Committee.