Following the Federal Government’s stance that tax remittance would increase within one week, a Port Harcourt-based stock broker, Mr Innocent Atago, has stated that the permutation could only succeed if states cooperated with the federal government on the drive.
According to the Federal Government, measures needed to bring the initiative to reality include partnership with various states, boards of internal revenue service and ensuring that enforcement of the collection of taxes would henceforth be undertaken by the federal and state governments.
Atago told our correspondent that formulating a policy was one thing while implementing it to the letter was another.
According to him, the federal government’s measure could succeed to, a large extent, if economic saboteurs were identified and done away with.
He explained that there was always a cabal that felt shortchanged each time a good policy comes on board even as he said “such cabal should be shut out” to enable the recent move achieve success.
It could be recalled that the Federal Government’s intention was made known recently by the Acting Executive chairman, Federal Inland Revenue Service, (FIR) Mr. Tunde Fowler on the sidelines of the 132nd meeting of the Joint Tax Board (JTB) in Abuja recently.
Fowler who is also the chairman of the JTB stated that the federal government’s target was to ensure that it achieved at least 99.9 per cent tax remittance compliance level.
He added that every taxable adult at the state level and every corporate organization at the federal was taxed and pays the appropriate amount even as he said the federal government would exchange information with state boards of internal revenue to enable it maintain a database.