By Giovanni Emephia
The Delta State Internal Revenue Service has given itself a pat on the back for the ‘tremendous progress’ it has recorded in revenue generation, as the economy continues to recover from the negative effect of the COVID-19 pandemic and other sundry economic drawbacks.
Sir Onyeme Stated this position today in Warri while addressing a meeting of members of the board of the Delta State Internal Revenue Service.
He noted that the whistleblower mechanism introduced by the Service had led to the recovery of about N3bn in back taxes from federal government ministries, departments and agencies in the form of Pay As You Earn, PAYE, remittances, as well as from individuals and corporate entities residing and doing business in Delta State.
Onyeme explained that other strategies put in place by the service to enhance revenue generation included the inauguration of the Joint Tax Force to check revenue leakages in road taxes’
The effort he said, had yielded positive results, as revenue generated from vehicle registration and renewal of documents had risen by over N400 million from April when the task force began operation, to September 2021, compared to the same period last year.
The chairman stated that the Service was still exploring what he termed ‘largely untapped revenue sources’ like online sports betting, Stamp Duties and Capital Gains Tax through the engagement of consultants and IT solution providers with expertise in these specific areas.
While acknowledging poor returns in respect of Personal Income Taxes in the self-employed sector, Onyeme said that the service had taken some measures in reviewing the activities and processes in that sector by intensifying data mining and gathering.
Another measure, according to him, was profiling of newly identified tax agents for the purpose of bringing them into the tax net to improve revenue generation from the informal sector.
The chairman revealed that the cumulative IGR collection for January to September 2021 stood at over #59bn, compared to the sum of N45.09bn collected in the same period of January to September 2020, representing an increase of #14.2bn or 31.50%.
However, the revenue service chairman said that the service would continue to strive to build on this performance to improve on its revenue generation capacity, and to surpass the 2021 revenue target set for it by the state government.
