The Anambra State government has vowed
to prosecute tax evaders this year in its effort to arouse the consciousness of
the people to tax payment.

The State’s Commissioner for Information, Chief Joemartin Uzodike told
newsmen in Onitsha, Friday, that the attorney-general of the state had
constituted a mobile court for the trial of the defaulters.

Uzodike lamented that it was only in Anambra that an individual would
be business amounted to millions of naira without any form of tax payment and
the government had been denied billions of naira, which have been used for the
development of the state.

The commissioner recalled that in the old Anambra State, made up of
Anambra, Enugu and part of Ebonyi, the taxes from the Onitsha Main Market was
used to pay the salaries of all local government workers.

“We will not continue like this. There is a need for a radical change
since what is supposed to be for the government ends up in individuals’ and
revenue agents’ pockets.

“Tax evaders should get ready and put on
their canvas shoes since we are going to chase them and harass them to pay up.

“And if they do not comply, we have no
option but to apprehend and move them to the mobile court instantly.

“Today, some small states in the country
make up to a billion naira monthly from taxes; while our own here, the money we
generate from tax  cannot pay the
salaries of just one local government area,” he said.