A legal practitioner, Jonathan Alua, has brought a case against Ghana’s Attorney-General and the Commissioner-General of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), challenging the legal basis for Customs officials to impose duties on mobile phones and other personal belongings carried by travellers.
The action was filed after a video circulated online in which Aaron Kanor, Commissioner of the Customs Division, appeared to say that enforcement would be introduced at all points of entry against travellers bringing more than two mobile phones into Ghana.
In a writ filed on 4 September 2026, Mr Alua argues that the GRA does not have the authority to waive or alter taxes for individual people or institutions without approval from Parliament.
He is asking the Supreme Court to rule that regulation 18(2)(b) of L.I. 2514 is unconstitutional. The regulation is understood to give the Commissioner-General and Customs officers the power to approve or refuse tax exemptions for individual passengers under section 17(1) of the Exemptions Act, 2022 (Act 1083).
Mr Alua says that power conflicts with Article 1(2) of Ghana’s 1992 Constitution because it allows exemptions to be granted on a discretionary, case-by-case basis without a prior parliamentary resolution.
He is also seeking an order directing the Attorney-General to prevent the Commissioner-General and Customs officials from using the power under regulation 18(2)(b) until Parliament has complied with the constitutional requirements set out in Article 174(2), or has specifically exempted the exercise of that power under Article 174(3).
The applicant is asking the court to award costs and make any further orders necessary to give effect to the declarations and restrictions sought.
Among the declarations requested is a ruling that the Commissioner-General’s authority under regulation 18(2)(b) of the Exemptions Regulations, 2025 (L.I. 2514), made under section 17(3) of Act 1083, amounts to the power to waive or vary a tax in favour of particular individuals or authorities.
Mr Alua argues that this authority has not been subjected to Parliament’s prior approval by resolution, as required by Article 174(2) of the Constitution.
He is further asking the Supreme Court to declare regulation 18(2)(b) invalid to the extent that it permits the Commissioner-General, or Customs officers acting under his authority, to grant or refuse exemptions to individual passengers without parliamentary approval.
The requested declaration also covers situations where Parliament has not passed a resolution under Article 174(3) exempting the exercise of that power from the requirements of Article 174(2).
A separate order sought by the applicant would restrain the second defendant from deciding, on an individual basis, whether passengers qualify for the exemption under section 17(1) of Act 1083 until the constitutional conditions have been met.
The case follows comments made by Mr Kanor during a recent media engagement at Accra International Airport while on a duty tour.
He said,”when you travel overseas, when you are coming, someone gives you seven phones (mobile), when you carry all those seven phones and you arrive [in Ghana], it will amount to commercial because as an individual, you are entitled to one. So we will implore that, when you are coming home, you do not collect people’s things, if you collect them and they are beyond two…, one individual can only carry two, one for yourself and one for your wife, and beyond that it will amount to commercial because all these phones are expensive, look at iphone, samsung, the latest one, they are very expensive phones and that is where we can get our revenue.”
The GRA subsequently issued a clarification on 3 September, saying travellers would not automatically be required to pay Customs duty simply because they were carrying more than two mobile phones.
“The Authority appreciates the concerns raised and wishes to clarify how Customs treats passenger baggage and personal effects.
It is not an automatic rule that a traveler carrying more than two mobile phones will be required to pay Customs duty.”
The authority said the main issue was whether the phones were genuinely intended for the traveller’s personal use or whether the circumstances suggested they were being brought in for someone else, for sale, distribution or another commercial purpose.
Customs officers, it said, would assess each situation individually. Their considerations could include the type and quantity of goods, whether the items were already in use, whether they were new and commercially packaged, the number of similar devices and whether the circumstances indicated an intention to sell or distribute them.
“The reference to a number of mobile phones was intended to illustrate circumstances in which Customs officers may need to make further enquiries. The number of phones carried does not, on its own, determine whether duty is payable.
A traveler may therefore legitimately carry more than one phone for personal reasons, such as a work device or a replacement handset, without the items necessarily being treated as commercial imports.
Where, however, a passenger carries several new or similarly packaged devices, particularly for other persons, Customs may need to establish whether the items qualify as personal effects or should appropriately be treated as imports.”
