By Mazi Ejimofor Opara
The whole noise about levies and revenue collection in Anambra for me has become self-mockery than political leverage for those who think they can exploit emotions to stall collective our development. And my reasons for this would be short and direct to the point.
First, let me state clearly, and I beg to be controverted, that relative to the rest of the Southeast and even Southern States Anambra’s levies are about the lowest. It is professionally true that taxes/Levies must trail income, meaning in strict terms that everyone who makes any form of income is expected to remit some fraction of it to the public pool. Ideally, this includes, petty traders, vulcanizers, barrow pushers, artisans etc. This is the ideal situation in places we envy and refer to as “saner climes”.
However, in Anambra the State is at loss in many ways than one when it comes to collection of levies for two reasons. One, the totality of the above mentioned category of citizens have been fully exempted from paying any form of taxes/levies. Gov. Soludo himself has announced at various public fora that anyone collecting levies from this category of persons in the State is a criminal and must be treated as such. Secondly, what Anambra collects as stallage levy for shops in public and private markets is nothing but a show of charity relative to States with even more diverse sources of revenue.
The whole idea of peddling choreographed videos to deceive the uninformed is, for me, petty politics. Before the current fee was arrived at, the Market leaders and traders themselves were fully engaged and they of their volition agreed that the 17,000 and 30,000 annual stallage fee was fair to all. Break this down on a month by month basis it comes to 1,460 and 2,500 per month respectively. This is what a shop owner in Anambra market is expected to pay to the government as levy and nothing more.
Fortunately, Governor Soludo is not in the class of Governors or leaders you can accuse of wasting tax payers money on frivolities. If any thing, he has shown great prudence to the awe of the people.
So, before you raise your 2G Android phone to make that ignorant video, understand first that you are in a place of mercy as a result of having a Governor who prioritizes your welfare, happiness and collective development over above any parochial interest.
