Akwa Ibom IGR hits N2bn monthly

Efforts by the Akwa Ibom State government to shore up its finances have paid off as it now nets a total of N2 billion as Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) monthly.

This follows the engagement of a new revenue consultant and the blocking of all leakages in the revenue collection processes. Before now, it generated a little above N1 billion monthly.

Akan Okon, commissioner for finance, who made this known in an exclusive interview with BusinessDay in Uyo, the state capital, said the attainment of the revenue target followed the engagement of a new revenue consultant by the state government.

“We have set a benchmark for the new consultants to get a minimum of N2 billion monthly as a start and this will be received within the next 12 months and they are meeting this target,’’ he said.

According to him, the state government is doing everything possible to ensure that it maximises the revenue potentials of the state, as new methods of revenue collection are being deployed while leakages associated with revenue collecting process are being blocked.

“We want to make sure that all legitimate sources of revenue that were not part of our focus are being explored,’’ he said.

He denied reports that the state government was owing workers’ salary, explaining that all those who had been “genuinely employed and have been captured by the payroll biometric system’’ were receiving their salaries as of when due.

The commissioner also highlighted the benefits of the restructuring of the commercial bank loans of the state government into Federal Government bonds, saying it had led to a significant reduction in the state’s debt service obligations.

“Before now, the state government was paying N3.5 billion monthly as debt but with the restructuring, we will only be paying N800 million monthly, thereby freeing about N2.5 billion monthly for the state to invest in development projects,’’ he said.

Okon, who also gave reasons for the introduction of the revised Pay As You Earn (PAYE) tax system for civil servants, said the non implementation of the system in the past had cost the state a lot of revenue losses, saying the state government was not interested in recovering the taxes that were not collected under the scheme between 2011 and 2014, when the tax system should had come into effect.

He said a rebate of 50 percent on the tax system had been approved by the state government, adding that instead of demanding the payment of 100 percent of the taxes from the new system, civil servants would only pay 50 percent of the tax despite the fact that new promotions that had been made in the civil service within the period the tax should had been implemented.

“Instead of paying 100 percent, civil servants have been given a 50 percent rebate,’’ he said, saying labour leaders should support the efforts of the state government in this regard, and dialogue would continue to be used in resolving all issues between labour and government.