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From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
Chairman of Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) and Ekiti State Governor, Kayode Fayemi, has attributed the increase in internally generated revenue of the federation’s 36 states over the past few years to implementation of administrative reforms and increased digitisation.
According to him, the innovations account for the increase in the 2021 IGR from N1.3 trillion to N1.7 trillion.
He spoke at the opening of the 8th edition of our IGR Peer Learning Event and Launch of the NGF Public Finance Database in Abuja.
He noted that all governors had purposefully resolved in 2019 to embark on consensus reforms aimed at ending multiple taxation, professionalising and modernizing our revenue services, and embracing a taxpayer-centric culture that eases taxpayer compliance and strengthens the existing social contract.
“This pact birthed the State Action Plan for Revenue Generation (SAPRG), whose implementation progress we will be examining today with the objective of underscoring what has worked and what we need to do better to foster an enabling tax environment and administration that allows us to optimise our revenue potential as subnationals.
“Our pursuit to do things differently has benefitted from the relentless efforts of our state officials, technical assistance programmes within our Secretariat and partners’ support. Your collaboration and support have ensured we stay the course of implementation, delivering far reaching reforms, which have yielded the results we see today.
“We have seen total IGR of States grow from NGN1.31 trillion in 2019 to NGN1.67 trillion in 2021 and the share of IGR (as % of total recurrent revenue) grow from 31% in 2019 to 35% in 2021. While this is good progress, we must not lose sight of the need to sustain and advance the momentum of reforms, considering the decline in FAAC receipts.”
