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| Dashe Arlat in the middle flanked by some directors during the media briefing today |
PSIRS: Chairman promises continuation of Rocket speed in Revenue
Generation in 2020.
By Joseph A .Adudu
January 07, 2020
The Executive Chairman of Plateau
State Inland Revenue Service (PSIRS), Dashe Arlat has commended the media,
management and staff of the Service for their commitment that led to the
laudable success achieved by the Service in 2019. Arlat made this statement on
Tuesday at the headquarters of PSIRS Jos while briefing the media on the score
card of the service in the last one year. The Chairman stated that despite the
challenges, the Service was able to make remarkable and unbelievable
achievements on the target given to it by the Government as result of staff
commitment and resilience as well as adequate publicity by the media.
Arlat said that a
budget of N16.4b was given to the
Service by the State Government in 2019 and the Service was able to collect as
revenue for the year, the sum of N16,480,111,593.83,
representing 89 per cent of the budget. He however said that as a Service, the
PSIRS's budget was N12.4b but it was
able to collect N13, 807, 480, 978. 36,
representing 111.5 percent in the year under review.
The Chairman
added that despite these laudable successes, the Service needed to do
more as a result of Government demand owing to series of factors like the new
minimum wage bill, the dwindling oil fortunes and other demands. “So, the best
for us is to look inward for other sources of income to run the state and so,
the task ahead of us is enormous because we must achieve more", said
Arlat.
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| Cross section of directors during the briefing |
The PSIRS
Chairman further revealed that the 2020 Budget for the Service was N16b while that of the state as contained
in the State Budget was N22b. He added
that the budget for Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) was N5.9b in 2019 but that only N2.6b was made by MDAs this year. “This
amount is lower than what was collected last year. So, we are working hard with
the MDAs to ensure that together, we jerk-up the revenue this year", he
said.
The Chief Revenue
Officer of the state said that because of enormous task ahead, the Service has
mapped out strategic Plan for the year, 2020 and further put so many things in
place to confirm its preparedness and readiness for the year 2020. Explaining
further, he said the Service was able to huge success last year as a result of
measures put in place which include expansion of its offices. "We opened
up our Offices because we discovered that the job of Revenue was not limited to
only Jos North and Jos South Local Government Areas. So, we enlarged ourselves
to cover all the various Local Government Areas of the state", he said.
The Chairman further said that the Service
also intensified the revenue drive in the informal Sector. "This
time, our staff were all over the streets, knocking at peoples' doors to make
sure they pay their taxes and we have seen that really improved our revenue
drive from the informal sector".
Arlat said that
the Service also expanded the Pay-as-You- earn ( PAYEE) net which has given the
Service a very good yield from the Private Sector. The Service, the Chairman said
embarked on Audit Investigation when it discovered that many Organizations
weren't remitting their taxes and the Service was able to realize about N6billion which he said improved the
revenue drive of the service. He however stated that the exercise would
continue this year to ensure that all Organizations complied. "The
exercise last year covered a period from 2005 to 2010 only. So, we still have
the period from 2011 to 2018 which is before us. From the Audit Report, we have
reconciled with some Organizations while tack meetings have been held with
others. So, if we are able to collect just 40 per cent of the tax liability,
that would place us very high as a government", Arlat said.
The PSIRS
Chairman stated that in the year under review, Government purchased for the
service fleet of Vehicles and have been distributed to all the 12 Zonal offices
of the service to compliment the ones already on ground for ease of movement.
The executive
Chairman stated that the strategic plan for the year 2020 was articulated with
the inputs of all members of the Management Team stressing that some of the
things the Service intended doing to achieve more success was to ensure that
every tax payer was captured in the tax net. "This year, we are going to
count every tax payer in the state because every tax payer means a lot to us.
We have an estimated population of 4 million in Plateau State. However, the
figure that we have now based on our data of the people who are remitting their
taxes is not up to 30 per cent of the population figure. It therefore means
that the rest of the people are just out there taking advantages of government
facilities in doing their businesses and making huge profits without remitting
their taxes", he said.
Arlat however
confessed that it may not be the fault of some individuals which is the reason
why the service was embarking on aggressive campaign awareness in 2020. He said
that in addition to that, the Service would adopt the dialogue strategy with
the leadership of Trade Unions and Associations through the presumptive tax
approach.
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He added that the
service also intended to increase the state revenue data from the current
figure of 400 thousand people to 1 million. This, he said the Service intended
to achieve by bringing all tax payers into the tax net by way of enumeration
stressing that the Service would encourage them by giving moderate assessment
based on presumptive tax rather than discouraging them through high assessment.
Arlat said that
monitoring and evaluation would be very strict in 2020 adding that mechanism
for reconfirmation would be established. He said that for administrative
convenience and accountability, work in the service has been fragmented saying
that it was the reason why there are so many departments in the Service.
The Chairman said
the aggressive awareness and enlightenment campaign the Service intended to
embarked on in 2020 was to encouraged voluntary remittance but that in the
event where it is obvious that people don't want to comply, the Service would
have no option than to apply the necessary sections of the law to ensure
compliance. The briefing was attended by all directors and heads of departments
of the Service.
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