Ogun Government Tasks Council Bosses On Improved IGR

Ogun State Government has enjoined Local Government Council Chairmen to intensify efforts at improving their Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) and not rely on the federal or state governments for funds.
The state’s Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Ganiyu Hamzat, stated this during the January 2023 edition of the Joint Account Allocation Committee (JAAC) meeting at the Oba’s Complex, Oke-Mosan, Abeokuta, Monday.
Hamzat said the move became imperative to enable them have more funds both from allocations and IGR to execute beneficial projects at the grassroots.
He insisted that the excess fund in the recent time needed to be increased in fulfillment of their mandate to their people.
The commissioner who disclosed that its inspectorate and monitoring department had commenced monitoring exercise to make project execution conform with the required standard stated that the ministry would continue to ensure that funds accruable to local council’s were well utilised.
In his presentation, Chief Economic Adviser to the Governor and Commissioner for Finance, Mr. Dapo Okubadejo, disclosed that N7,661,239,092.01 was received as December 2022 allocation for the 20 councils in the state, which emanated from Statutory Revenue, Value Added Taxes (VAT), Exchange Gain, Electronic Money Transfer Levy (EMTL) and Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme (SURE-P).
Represented by the Permanent Secretary and Accountant General of the State Treasury, Babatunde Aregbesola, Okubadejo said N7,221,233,073.00 would be used to pay the first-line charges, which included primary school teachers’ salary, local council staff salary, pensions, traditional councils, other payment of Pay-As-You-Earn (PAYE) arrears, statutory payment to Local Government Service Commission, release to local councils and other charges.
He added that it excluded PAYE and five per cent bond on pension, amounting to N314,164,709.56, which was yet to be effected, while N754,170,728.57 remained as gross surplus for the month.
Also Speaking, the Permanent Secretary in the ministry, Kolawole Fagbohun, urged the chairmen to make judicious use of funds available at their disposal to embark on projects that would improve the lots of their people.