FG agencies owe N2bn tax arrear–Edo State Governor, Adams Oshiomhole The Edo State Board of Internal Revenue on Wednesday said 33 federal ministries, departments and agencies in the state owed the state N1,361,404,037.45 unremitted workers’ Pay as You Earn tax for the years 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012. The BIR chairman, Chief Oseni Elamah, who said this explained that the Power Holding Company of Nigeria alone owed the state government N680m unremitted PAYE workers’ taxes, in addition to the over N1.36bn owed by the MDAs. Elamah said the tax liabilities were not inclusive of those of other agencies, whose records had not been obtained by the board, adding that many of the MDAs failed to comply with tax laws requiring that they filed returns for tax computation of their workers in the state. He spoke as a follow-up to Tuesday’s sealing off of the Benin administrative offices of the Federal Airport Authorities of Nigeria by the revenue board, stressing that payment of tax was a matter of law. “It is in this light that the Federal Government has been deducting N825m Value Added Tax owed by previous governments from the state monthly allocation,” he said. He said the court order, served on the FAAN authorities, was granted in May 2013 and accused the Airport Manager, Sunday Ayodele, of creating the “dubious impression that he was not aware of tax liabilities against FAAN, whereas, there had been correspondences between BIR and FAAN on the issue.” Elamah, who, along with Ayodele, was driven to the state police headquarters and later released, accused the Airport Manager of “orchestrating a scheme to blackmail Board of Internal Revenue by shutting down the airport operations.” He said, “The manager locked the gates and when he (Elamah) forced the gates open, the manager switched off generators, electrical appliances and resorted to physical assault on staff of BIR. “The court order was not in any way to have affected airport operations, but in an attempt to blackmail, the manager sealed off the airport. “We will not do anything outside the law; the board has 20 court orders pending against various Federal Government agencies in the state.”
Posted on: Thu, 01 Aug 2013 10:23:32 +0000
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