Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, ostensibly copying from the political manifesto of the PDP candidate, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, THE SIMPLE AGENDA, has directed that henceforth revenue collection by the two tiers of government in Edo State shall harmonise collection of taxes and pay using POS terminals.
It will be recalled that Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, who is challenging the INEC declared victory of Mr Obaseki, had promised to revolutionize revenue collection, removing the illegal contractors and replacing them with governnent officials who will use modern and humane means to collect revenue including but not limited to the use of POS to prevent corruption and help in proper accounting.
Mr Obaseki said that government would establish an electronic platform that will collect revenue by the means of Point of Service (POS) or revenue scratch cards for those who do not have ATM cards.
It was learnt that Governor Godwin Obaseki had directed Heads of Local Government administration in the state to forward names of contractors initially contracted as revenue collectors to government house to jumpstart the job scheme, following recommendation by the emergency Elema/Shaibu committee that was raised after pointed errors and loopholes in Obaseki’s new year banning of private revenue contractors.
This new compromise stance of the Obaseki regime, information gathered, is yielding to the pressures and threats by the so-called invalidated revenue contractors (Agberos) who have been having running battles with Obaseki’s regime over their continued right of revenue collection in Edo state which, many believe, was the underlying reason why one of their major leaders, NoMoreLess was thrown in jail albeit by the pretext of threat to life.
Another member of the Agberos, Shaaba, who heads the Professional Drivers on Wheels, a few days ago, had a bloody fight with members of the Oredo council revenue collection officers over collection of revenue in Benin City. This prompted the party, APC, to invite their leader, former governor Adams Oshiomhole, to intervene.
Governor Obaseki was said to have been advised to pipe low because those guys might testify against him in court because they knew and did too much that might cost them Obaseki his gubernatorial seat at the tribunal if they continued to be aggrieved.
Our sources reported that the new year speech by Obaseki would be successfully challenged in court by any of the contractors that were purportedly banned and the police and citizens would not be able to do anything to stop them because Obaseki’s new year speech purportedly invalidating the government’s previous arrangements with those so-called revenue contractors (aka Agberos) amounted to mere puff and unenforceable because the contractors were duly appointed by official documentation and legal instruments and could not be removed by mere pronouncement of the governor as if we were still in a military regime. We advised the government free of charge to consider making a law to make the speech valid, enforceable and sustainable.
Realizing their embarrassing error highlighted by the Our sources’ report, Obaseki was quickly advised to make amends and get a law to validate the governor’s speech to give it force of law.
In resolving the matter, former governor Oshiomhole is reported to have asked to be allowed to resolve the matter in his own way within two weeks since it was he who created the “monsters” that Obaseki is confronted with in his revenue drive because Edo state is broke and heavily indebted due to government corruption and waste perpetrated by the former APC government.
Thus, Oshiomhole’s men, Philip Shaibu – the Deputy Governor and Oseni Elema – Head of Board of Internal Revenue, and Osarodion Ogie – Secretary to the Government of Edo State, were constituted to draft a new bill to the House of Assembly which will mandate the councils to allow the state governor to decide a common rate for them and also decide on who becomes the revenue collector.
It is expected that this law will be challenged by many councils in due course when elected councils emerge, especially in the face of the fact that governors no longer have the powers to remove council chairman by the new supreme court ruling.
A government statement on Friday said the submission of the contractors’ names was in furtherance of government’s avowed commitment to streamline tax collection in the state. But investigation has revealed that Obaseki wants to appoint Mr Rotimi, aka Shaaba, the head of Professional Drivers of Wheels, as the chief revenue collector and that the issue of submission of names was a mere formality.
Speaking to newsmen after the meeting, Chairman of Edo State Internal Revenue Service, Chief Oseni Elamah, said the concerned contractors are those previously selected to collect revenue on behalf of the local governments.
Chief Elema disclosed that the concerned contractors were also required to supply the names of their staff, phone numbers and passport photographs respectively adding that, “this is with a view to capturing their details in our employment database”.
Continuing, he said, “in addition to this, the MDs of all those that were engaged as consultants or contractors have also been directed to supply the names of those people that were involved, the staff they used, their numbers and their photographs so that we can consider them for employment under the first 10,000 youths’ employment programme that the government is already working on.”
To complete this process, Elamah noted that a portal will be opened where their biometrics will be captured and they will be given first offer under the new programme as a result of experience which they must have gained in their previous assignment of manually collecting revenue, which they were given.
He said, “They will undergo training before eventual recruitment will be made”.
The chairman noted that: “under this, we are also working towards eliminating cash as a means of revenue collection.
“We are going to establish an electronic platform that will collect revenue by the means of POS or revenue scratch cards for those who do not have ATM card.
“Under that law, the processes or procedure and time frame for whatever revenue and taxes that have been collected will be clearly stated and publicised,” Elemah said.
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