The Commissioner-General of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), Anthony Sarpong, has cleared up confusion about the new Publican AI system.
Speaking on Friday, April 10, Mr Sarpong explained that the system doesn’t set values for imported goods. Instead, it spots suspicious declarations for closer looks.
“Let me be clear, Publican does not determine values. It flags suspicious transactions,” he said.
Sarpong highlighted how Publican detects various risks in import declarations, like issues with goods’ origins.
“One, in the area of narcotics and all that, it can flag and say these goods are coming from a country of high narcotic or a source of banned substances, so watch it,” he said.
He pointed out that the system also scrutinises declared values and pulls real-time global data to check if prices make sense.
“The way Publican works is that it looks at real-time global data and says, let’s say you went to buy rice, it will look at the data and determine the highest and lowest prices that commodity has been sold for.
“If the importer’s declaration is within that range, Publican gives it a green, because it means you are within the possible lowest and highest price. If you are below it, then Publican will say we’ve never seen this price before, so I’m flagging it for the officer to deal with,” he explained.
Mr Sarpong added that these alerts don’t prove guilt and that importers might rather just snag a great deal.
He further noted that big-volume importers often have pre-approved prices, which officers consider during reviews, and Customs officers always make the final call on values, not the AI.
“To confirm, Publican does not determine values. It flags and allows officers to go into the matter and determine what value should be used for duty assessment,” he said.
