Gov. Abubakar Sani-Bello of Niger, on Monday, cautioned revenue collection officers against multiple taxation and levies on residents, who were up to date in paying their taxes.
Bello gave the warning at a 3-day training and interactive workshop on harmonised state and local government revenue law 2020, organised by the state internal revenue service.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the workshop was in conjunction with the office of the Secretary to the State Government, and the Ministry for Local Government, as well as Niger State Local Government Service Commission.
Bello explained that the workshop was coming at a time when the state was going through financial challenges and the need to increase its revenue generation, through harmonised revenue collection.
The governor urged the revenue staff to increase their nets of revenue collection, as well as avoid multiple taxation and placing a burden on those that were already paying.
“The state has continued to experience shortfall from Federal allocation, therefore, it is necessary for the state and local governments to work together to increase our internally generated revenue (IGR).
“Through harmonised revenue collection, we should be able to generate between N2 billion to N3 billion monthly, to augment what we get from federal allocation to make the state sustainable,” he said.
In his remarks, Alhaji Ahmed Gunna, Acting Chairman of the State Internal Revenue Service, explained that the partnering was aimed at building a revenue profile for the state and local governments councils.
He said that the state internal revenue would explore more IGR sources to augment the federal allocation, while working towards blocking leakages, eliminating incidence of multiple taxation, and deployment of ICT technology in tax collection.
Also, Mr Nasara Dan-Mallam, the state Attorney General and Commissioner of Justice, disclosed that the law implied that the revenue generated would be domiciled with the state internal revenue services. (NAN)
