Enugu To Realise 50 % Of Budget Through IGR

The Enugu State Government
says it is determined to raise its internally generated revenue to 50 per cent of its budget by 2020.
The state’s Commissioner for Budget and Planning, Mr Kester Agbowo, announced the plan in Enugu during the 2014 budget breakdown.
Agbowo said that strict measures had been put in place by the government to ensure its actualisation.
According to him, the fluctuation of monthly statutory allocation from the Federal Government had made a compelling challenge for the state government to diversify its sources of revenue.
“We are doing all we can to improve our IGR. As of 2007, the IGR of the state was N600 million but now, it has risen to N14 billion.
“We adopted a strategy during a high level IGR summit involving all the commissioners, permanent secretaries and all the agencies because we consider it a priority.
“If we leave office by 2015 and bequeath the development of the state to another government and if there is no increasing amount of money coming into the coffers to maintain it, this state will go back to its former state,’’ he said.
In his contribution, the state’s Commissioner for Finance and Economic Development, Mr Godson Nnadi, said the government would ensure the implementation of the 2014 budget christened “Budget of Actualisation.”
Also speaking, the Chairman of the Enugu State Board of Internal Revenue, Mr Felix Chime, said the board had adopted a compulsory tax payment measure to block leakages and tax evasion.
Chime said that the monthly tax receipts have increased to N1.4 billion from N30 million.
The chairman said the state was planning to codify all levies and tax processes as part of efforts to curb multiple taxation.
He appealed to the citizens of the state to ensure prompt payment of their taxes to enable the government to improve the state.
Infrastructure, transportation, education, good governance and security took a large chunk of the budget.
The 2014 budget of N93 billion was N9 billion or 11 per cent higher than the N84 billion budgeted in 2013.