Dato' Sri Khazali Bin Haji Ahmad, Director General of
Customs, Royal Malaysian Customs and his department completed
the successful
implementation of GST, at a rate of 6%, on April 1 last
year. In spite of
protests against the tax around the time of its one-year
anniversary last month, more than 400,000 companies have
registered for the GST and more than RM30 billion ($7.7
billion) was collected from companies in 2015, which was more
than the government’s target of RM27 billion
target. Bin Haji Ahmad became director general of customs
nearly four years ago, on June 22 2012.
The director-general’s award was one of 61
presented at a dinner in Singapore. It was the sixth Asia Tax
Awards ceremony, though the first since 2010.
KPMG was the most successful firm, winning 14 awards,
including Asia Tax Firm of the Year and Asia International Tax
Firm of the Year. They were followed by Deloitte, winners in 11
categories, PwC, who won seven awards and Baker & McKenzie,
victorious six times. EY and Yulchon, with two apiece, were the
other multiple winners. Twenty four different firms won
awards.
As well as the award for bin Haji Ahmad, individual winners
included Mark Tamayo of SGV & Co in the Philippines, who
won the award for Asia tax practice leader of the year; Shanwu
Yu of Baker & McKenzie, who was named transfer pricing
practice leader of the year, and Tarun Gulati, of PDS Legal in
India, who won in the tax disputes & litigation practice
leader of the year category.
Download the winners here
Read about the announcement of the shortlists
here
Methodology
Between January and February 2016, companies, law firms, tax
advisers, accountants and other tax service providers from
these jurisdictions:
Australia; China; Hong Kong; India; Indonesia; Japan;
Malaysia; Myanmar; New Zealand; Pakistan; Philippines;
Singapore; South Korea; Taiwan; Thailand and Vietnam
were eligible to submit three examples of their best work
for consideration for the national tax, transfer pricing, and
litigation and disputes awards.
The awards for Asia Tax Firm of the Year, Asia Transfer
Pricing Firm of the Year, Asia Tax Litigation and Disputes Firm
of the Year, Asia Indirect Tax Firm of the Year and Best
Newcomer (international tax practices of <5 years) will be
judged from these submissions.
There were separate submission forms for the regional awards
covering indirect tax, tax transactions, US corporate tax,
FATCA / withholding tax, tax compliance & reporting, global
mobility services, innovation and tax technology.
The awards will be judged according to:
- Size (Not conclusive, though
it does indicate what a tax team is capable of taking
on)
- Innovation (Did the advice
the firm gave show something more than the straightforward
answer that is commonly used?)
- Complexity (Did the matter address
tax issues that were out of the ordinary and what ingenuity
did the firm show to solve them?)
- Impact (What impact did the advice
have on the taxpayer? For example, did it help them take over
their biggest rival? Issue equity and debt in a particular
market for the first time? Win an unprecedented judgement in
court? Where did it help them become more efficient and
profitable? Was there a demonstrable effect on official
policy development?