WHAT NIGERIANS SHOULD BE CHANNELING THEIR ENERGIES ON AND NOT TRUMP & BIDEN
November 13, 2020 | News
In a recent video posted online which depicts just one of the many issues plaguing the country, that I believe Nigerians should channel their energies and time on, rather than spending their time and resources debating online/offline about the US Presidential Elections between Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
WHAT NIGERIANS SHOULD BE CHANNELING THEIR ENERGIES ON AND NOT TRUMP & BIDEN
In a recent video posted online which depicts just one of the many issues plaguing the country, that I believe Nigerians should channel their energies and time on, rather than spending their time and resources debating online/offline about the US Presidential Elections between Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
I am sure many business owners, small or big, would relate with the lady in the said video concerning this problem of corruption/multiple taxations and gross abuse of public office and the rule of law by supposed government officials. The video is on a woman in her mid-30s, who owns a thriving Restaurant business in Abuja. But like most businesses in Nigeria, she is being frustrated by a local Government tax force office known as the Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC).
According to the lady, the said AMAC officials recently went to her Gwarinpa Branch Restaurant in Abuja in the morning hours, and sealed the place with people still inside, including customers. One begins to wonder how do you seal a business place with people/customers right inside? And their reason for doing so was that they needed to see the Food Handler receipts that were paid in respect of the Restaurant business. But when the lady in question, who happens to be the owner of the restaurant business, was contacted while this was happening, she told them that the receipts and all the other documents are in the main branch of the Restaurant in Wuse area of Abuja. And that they should either come to the said Main Branch or wait at the Gwarinpa branch for the said receipts to be brought to them. Only for the lady to be told by the said AMAC official that: “Madam, it’s either we lock it up or you give us N250,000.” How do they expect her to cough out such an amount of money, for something she has already paid for and has a receipt to show for it?
While expressing her frustration, the lady said: “I know it is not just me that this is happening to because it is happening to a lot of business owners in the country. But this is not fair. We work from morning till night and everyday, just to make sure that we attain this success. We make sure that we help those people that work under us. You can’t expect us to be doing business everyday and these AMAC people will come and be frustrating us… Must they be bribed to do everything in this country? … Which Court Order will tell you to shut down a place with people still inside? And it is either they shut it down or they are given money… Why do we have to bribe them to do their jobs? … Why punish people who do the right thing… I am just tired of this country.”
Even after the lady said she contacted them to have the situation addressed, the said AMAC officials refused to come and open up the sealed Restaurant. Thereby leaving the people still inside for hours. Whereas, according to her, she has paid for everything that is required of her in accordance with the law, to rightly and legitimately operate her Restaurant business. She also noted how they come in different sets and groups every other day, and with different receipts, to extort and demand for these levies/taxes from her and other business owners. These are some of things that often make one wonder the sort of country we have found ourselves in?
This reminds me of the exact situation we also have happening in Warri and environs, and across the whole of Delta State. Where, the payment of frivolous levies/taxes, unilaterally introduced in Delta State, especially in Warri and environs, has become unbearable and worrisome and urgently needs to be addressed. The existing Board of Internal Revenue and other Delta State Government Institutions and structures that stand as Local Government Councils in Delta State, through the umbrella of the Delta State Government Agencies, Ministries, as well as youths (often referred to as ‘Agberos’), are known to impose all manners of levies/taxes on residents, business owners, motorists and others in Delta State on a daily, monthly and yearly basis. All they know how to do is to go about taxing the poor masses that are trying to make ends meet, for their private pockets and self-centered interests.
Just on Friday, November 6th, 2020, the Office of the Delta State Urban & Regional Town Planning Board led by one Mr. Peter Amaduoboha and Mr. Emmanuel Ebi Temewei, mobilized a bulldozer with about 20 armed Police Officers and went and demolished a line of Stores at Ugboroke New Layout, Effurun Delta State, which had pending court cases. The said Government Officials not only disregarded and disrespected the rule of law and court processes, but they also rendered struggling business people with no means of livelihood. That is the sort of impunity we see happen only in this part of the world.
Again, those of the Delta State Internal Revenue Board are said to coerce and use all manners of threats to exploit and extort money from business owners, especially ‘one-man business enterprises’ trying to make a living. These set of private business owners, despite paying their Personal Income Taxes, are still exploited and coerced by those of the Delta State Internal Revenue to cough out outrageous sums in the name of tax and levies. The situation is getting so bad that private investors/companies and prospective entrepreneurs are shying away from the State. Almost everywhere in Delta State, especially in Warri, Effurun, Udu, Ekpan, Ovwian, Orhuwhorun, Ugboroke, Patani, Sapele, Ughelli, etc, Deltans and Nigerians in Delta State are frequently being harassed and exploited with one tax/levy or the other by these off-shoots of Delta State Government and its Local Government Councils and their ‘tentacles’.
It is one thing for the Government to seek out other avenues of internal revenue through taxation, but it is another thing entirely for the said Government to judiciously and transparently use the same tax collected for the single purpose of improving the daily lives of its people.
While the payment of tax/levies is necessary to generate internal revenue, but it is absolutely wrong and extortion of the highest order to have State Government, Local Government Councils and their ‘extensions’ to demand taxes/levies/charges for public services they have not been able to provide. In the UK and other advanced countries around the world, State and Local Government Councils and their activities are daily felt by the people. The collection and extortion of taxes/levies/charges from the general public, without commensurate utilities and public necessities that would account for and justify such collections/taxes, is absolutely wicked, mindless, and stealing from the people. And this has to stop!
And like I said, this is one, out of the many problems Nigerians should channel their energies on and demand that the Government should have them addressed. Instead of the time and energies, they channel on what is happening in the US, UK, and other developed countries that care less about what is happening in Nigeria.
Zik Gbemre.
November 13, 2020.
We Mobilize Others To Fight For Individual Causes As If Those Were Our Causes
In a recent video posted online which depicts just one of the many issues plaguing the country, that I believe Nigerians should channel their energies and time on, rather than spending their time and resources debating online/offline about the US Presidential Elections between Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
I am sure many business owners, small or big, would relate with the lady in the said video concerning this problem of corruption/multiple taxations and gross abuse of public office and the rule of law by supposed government officials. The video is on a woman in her mid-30s, who owns a thriving Restaurant business in Abuja. But like most businesses in Nigeria, she is being frustrated by a local Government tax force office known as the Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC).
According to the lady, the said AMAC officials recently went to her Gwarinpa Branch Restaurant in Abuja in the morning hours, and sealed the place with people still inside, including customers. One begins to wonder how do you seal a business place with people/customers right inside? And their reason for doing so was that they needed to see the Food Handler receipts that were paid in respect of the Restaurant business. But when the lady in question, who happens to be the owner of the restaurant business, was contacted while this was happening, she told them that the receipts and all the other documents are in the main branch of the Restaurant in Wuse area of Abuja. And that they should either come to the said Main Branch or wait at the Gwarinpa branch for the said receipts to be brought to them. Only for the lady to be told by the said AMAC official that: “Madam, it’s either we lock it up or you give us N250,000.” How do they expect her to cough out such an amount of money, for something she has already paid for and has a receipt to show for it?
While expressing her frustration, the lady said: “I know it is not just me that this is happening to because it is happening to a lot of business owners in the country. But this is not fair. We work from morning till night and everyday, just to make sure that we attain this success. We make sure that we help those people that work under us. You can’t expect us to be doing business everyday and these AMAC people will come and be frustrating us… Must they be bribed to do everything in this country? … Which Court Order will tell you to shut down a place with people still inside? And it is either they shut it down or they are given money… Why do we have to bribe them to do their jobs? … Why punish people who do the right thing… I am just tired of this country.”
Even after the lady said she contacted them to have the situation addressed, the said AMAC officials refused to come and open up the sealed Restaurant. Thereby leaving the people still inside for hours. Whereas, according to her, she has paid for everything that is required of her in accordance with the law, to rightly and legitimately operate her Restaurant business. She also noted how they come in different sets and groups every other day, and with different receipts, to extort and demand for these levies/taxes from her and other business owners. These are some of things that often make one wonder the sort of country we have found ourselves in?
This reminds me of the exact situation we also have happening in Warri and environs, and across the whole of Delta State. Where, the payment of frivolous levies/taxes, unilaterally introduced in Delta State, especially in Warri and environs, has become unbearable and worrisome and urgently needs to be addressed. The existing Board of Internal Revenue and other Delta State Government Institutions and structures that stand as Local Government Councils in Delta State, through the umbrella of the Delta State Government Agencies, Ministries, as well as youths (often referred to as ‘Agberos’), are known to impose all manners of levies/taxes on residents, business owners, motorists and others in Delta State on a daily, monthly and yearly basis. All they know how to do is to go about taxing the poor masses that are trying to make ends meet, for their private pockets and self-centered interests.
Just on Friday, November 6th, 2020, the Office of the Delta State Urban & Regional Town Planning Board led by one Mr. Peter Amaduoboha and Mr. Emmanuel Ebi Temewei, mobilized a bulldozer with about 20 armed Police Officers and went and demolished a line of Stores at Ugboroke New Layout, Effurun Delta State, which had pending court cases. The said Government Officials not only disregarded and disrespected the rule of law and court processes, but they also rendered struggling business people with no means of livelihood. That is the sort of impunity we see happen only in this part of the world.
Again, those of the Delta State Internal Revenue Board are said to coerce and use all manners of threats to exploit and extort money from business owners, especially ‘one-man business enterprises’ trying to make a living. These set of private business owners, despite paying their Personal Income Taxes, are still exploited and coerced by those of the Delta State Internal Revenue to cough out outrageous sums in the name of tax and levies. The situation is getting so bad that private investors/companies and prospective entrepreneurs are shying away from the State. Almost everywhere in Delta State, especially in Warri, Effurun, Udu, Ekpan, Ovwian, Orhuwhorun, Ugboroke, Patani, Sapele, Ughelli, etc, Deltans and Nigerians in Delta State are frequently being harassed and exploited with one tax/levy or the other by these off-shoots of Delta State Government and its Local Government Councils and their ‘tentacles’.
It is one thing for the Government to seek out other avenues of internal revenue through taxation, but it is another thing entirely for the said Government to judiciously and transparently use the same tax collected for the single purpose of improving the daily lives of its people.
While the payment of tax/levies is necessary to generate internal revenue, but it is absolutely wrong and extortion of the highest order to have State Government, Local Government Councils and their ‘extensions’ to demand taxes/levies/charges for public services they have not been able to provide. In the UK and other advanced countries around the world, State and Local Government Councils and their activities are daily felt by the people. The collection and extortion of taxes/levies/charges from the general public, without commensurate utilities and public necessities that would account for and justify such collections/taxes, is absolutely wicked, mindless, and stealing from the people. And this has to stop!
And like I said, this is one, out of the many problems Nigerians should channel their energies on and demand that the Government should have them addressed. Instead of the time and energies, they channel on what is happening in the US, UK, and other developed countries that care less about what is happening in Nigeria.
Zik Gbemre.
November 13, 2020.
We Mobilize Others To Fight For Individual Causes As If Those Were Our Causes