Set To Embark On Aggressive Revenue Drive
The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Muhammed Bello, has stated that his administration will launch an aggressive revenue campaign in the territory in order to surpass Lagos as the country’s largest revenue generator.
He said that the country’s reliance on oil money to pay its budget had ended.
He promised to put income diversification concepts into action in such a way that the FCT will outperform other states in terms of Internally Generated Revenue (IGR), particularly Lagos.
The minister, on Wednesday, addressed a training for FCTA Revenue Desk Officers titled “Improving Revenue Generation for FCTA.”
The minister, who was represented by FCTA Mandate Secretary Lukman Dabiri Agboola, who is in charge of Economic Planning, Revenue Generation, and Public-Private Partnership, said the revenue diversification effort represents a new beginning for the FCT administration.
“I am not delighted that our revenue drive falls so far behind Lagos, which has an IGR of 69.1 billion, the second-highest in the country,” he remarked.
“An aggressive revenue drive in the FCT is required to compete with Lagos State’s income base, despite the negative consequences for revenue officials.”
“At the moment, the world’s reliance on oil and budget is coming to an end.
“The only way out for us is to build on our revenue base, budget is about procrastination because it is the money you do not have at hand. But revenue is the sure money we can always plan for.
“Today, Lagos State depends solely on revenue collection, not on a budget. We have NEPAD and other international institutions for support, but the only way we can get them to come to us is if they have the assurance that we will pay the money back to them.
“If there is no way that we will pay the money back to them, they will not be there to give us any support or soft landing. If Lagos State today needs N400 billion support from any institution abroad they will get it within a week, because of their revenue base. I want the same thing for Abuja and FCTA.”
He, however, ordered the revenue officers to go out and gather the revenue for the FCTA so that everyone could feel at ease in the territory.
