Abia targets top-10 in ease of doing business in Nigeria

to prosecute economic saboteurs 

Ongoing reforms in Abia State are geared towards improving infrastructure and providing an enabling environment for businesses to thrive, says Governor Okezie Ikpeazu.

Ikpeazu, in a recent media chat, expressed displeasure over the state’s low ranking in the scale of ease of doing business and revealed that his administration was working hard to be among the top-ten in Nigeria in the days ahead.

According to the governor, “We noticed that we were not doing well on the scale of ease of doing business. We were in the last quarter of 36, but today we are working towards a score that will bring us among the first 10 states in the country.”

The state government was constructing a one-stop shop to be known as “revenue building” in Umuahia, the state capital, which will accommodate all state revenue departments to reduce bottlenecks in the processing of documents, he said.

People are expected to walk in there, get acquainted with all the taxes they are supposed to pay and all the processes and procedures for opening new businesses, so that, at the end of the day, they can walk out, and in seven days they are up and running, he said.

“If we are able to achieve the target of getting new businesses started from registration to commencement of business in Abia, within seven days, then certainly, we will be among the first 10 states in Nigeria on the scale of ease of doing business,” he said.

On the ongoing verification exercise embarked upon by his administration to weed out ghost workers and close all leakages in the civil service, the governor revealed that the state had so far saved N270 million monthly, from the exercise.

He explained that money saved from the exercise had helped to sustain the ongoing road projects across the state, saying “we will continue to look into these leakages, because we know that the incidence of ghost workers has eaten deep into the fabrics of our operations, such that those who perpetrate it will want to device other means to continue.

“As you plug one hole today, they will try to open another one. But we want to assure them that we will meet them there, as we will not let go.

“In the days ahead, you will expect that those with proven cases of economic sabotage against our state will be brought to book and disciplined according to civil service rules. Therefore, this is the time for our people to have a rethink and do things the proper way.” Meanwhile, he said the state had disbursed all outstanding salary arrears to commercial banks for onward payment to civil servants.

This development is in line with the governor’s pledge to ensure that all salaries and pension arrears in the state are offset by October 30, 2015.

Obinna Oriaku, chairman, Bailout Funds Management Committee, in a statement, disclosed that all outstanding salaries and pensions in Abia State had been transmitted to banks for onward disbursement to their beneficiaries.