Enugu Generates N35.9 Billion from Tax in Seven Months

Gideon Arinze in Enugu

The Enugu State Government has announced that it generated the sum of N35.9 billion as tax revenue between January and July 2024.
Executive Chairman, Enugu State Internal Revenue Service (ESIRS), Emmanuel Nnamani, made this known yesterday while addressing journaists on the first year activities of the ESIRS.

Nnamani said that the government also generated N33.9 billion from taxes in 2023, a significant increase upon the N2.3 billion it met on assumption of office, adding that Enugu State currently records an average tax collection of N5 billion monthly.

He noted that the success recorded so far was as a result of the proactive efforts of the state government, which includes the activation of dormant taxes and expansion of the tax net to include businesses that were formally not paying their taxes.
“For instance, when we came in, we discovered that companies that should be in the formal sector mixed with the informal sector and were not filing their PAYE and withholding taxes. We had to bring them in,” he explained.

Speaking further, he said “We activated the collection of capital gain tax arising from sale of lands at the Ministry of Land and Housing and that meant that for every consent, there must be capital gains tax paid. We also activated the purchase tax that hitherto was in the law but was not implemented.”
He explained that the government has also expanded the payment gateways to include platforms such as Moniepoint, Interswitch, Quick teller, E-transact and Flutterwave to ease the process of tax payment for businesses in the state.

He said that the enforcement of the taxes didn’t not come without pushbacks, noting however, that the backing of the state Governor, Peter Mbah, made the process a lot easier.