A group, Igbo National Movement (INM), has urged governors of South East extraction and their Houses of Assembly to legislate and implement Value Added Tax (VAT) like their Rivers state counterparts.
The National Convener of INM, Mr Anthony Okolo, who stated this in a statement, said it would engineer massive developments across states as well as reduce dependence on federal allocations.
According to Okolo, the recent re -establishment of Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers state of the rights of the state to collect VAT should be an eye opener to other governors in the country as it was “unjust usurpation of the states’ rights for federal government to collect Taxes in states area of jurisdiction.”
He said that “Rivers state has led the way in revealing that the federal government is involved in one of the greatest acts of fraud and larceny against the indigenous nationals of Nigeria. It can never be viewed as justice to make our muslim brothers partake in the sharing of income from haram acts, which have occurred from activities forbidden in Islam, such as sales of alcohol and interest transactions from commercial lending.
“It cannot also be viewed as justice to deny a State that has spent millions in developing planned neighbourhoods and estates, the full value of their investment, under the guise of remittance of Value Added Tax, to the Federal Government who has neither spent a dime in development of that neighbourhood, nor is committed to returning the value remitted to it, back to the State for re-investment in more infrastructure.”
Continuing, he argued that opportunities which supporting this stance would bring include “infrastructural developments, prompt payment of salaries, meet their pension commitments, activate welfare projects and sustain their policies which are geared at creating a better life for our people. It will mean less trips to Abuja to beg for money that is by right already ours.
“It will mean the establishment of hospitals, roads, schools and security installations to ward off the terrorist organisations that threaten our safety and security. These things can be achieved if our Governors follow the path of truth and if our legislators are brave to fight the good fight to secure the future of our children.”
