Gov Bello charges ministries, MDAs on revenue drives

KOGI State Governor Alhaji Yahaya Bello has charged Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) in the state to cooperate and collaborate with the management of  to improve the Internally Generated Revenue of the state to enable government to provide the desired dividend of democracy to the people of Kogi state.

Governor Bello gave the charge in Government House Lokoja during internally generated revenue strategic workshop with MDAs organised by the management of KGIRS to chat way forward for an improved revenue generation of the state.

The governor who emphasised on the need to blocked all leakages in order to harness the potentials abound in the revenue generation of the state said the government can not provide adequate security of life and property including the desired infrastructural development without an improve revenue generation to complement the federal allocation to the state.

“We will soon be back to the second term that will kick off on the 27th of January, 2020. We are elected to serve the people through delivering the dividend of democracy and we can not do that without finance from revenue.

“We are faced with a lot of security challenges, there are emerging threats from kidnappers, banditry among others.

“And for us to be able to do these, we need a lot of funds so we need the support of MDAs to help us in improving the revenue generation so that we can help our people especially the downtrodden. We will not want to enforce the laws but it should comply with the interest of the state.

“We need the cooperation and understanding of MDAs in ensuring that we blocked all loopholes by strictly adhering to all the laws to drive all the revenue by expanding base to enable us generate enough income for the state so that we can satisfy our people in the area of infrastructure development such as education, health, youth empowerment, payment of N30,000 minimum and provision basic social amenities among others,” he said.

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Governor Bello who promised to be transparent in spending every kobo accrued to the state urged the ministry of finance to ensure prudence in the management of the resources of the state.

“Government money whether federal allocation or internally generated revenue or grant and donation, nobody can spend it without the approval by the authority saddled with that responsibility.

Every kobo generated you must be authorised to spend it and if you are spending it you must have value for such expenditure because if we take care and safeguard our one naira then our billions would be safeguarded. He advised.

Presenting the recommendations of KGIRS toward an improved revenue generation to the governor for approval, the Executive Chairman of the revenue service Mr
Aliyu Inda Salami recommended to the state government to improve capacity delivering of MDAs in terms of personnel training, the release of monthly impress and necessary working tools are the major interventions required from government to enhance the service delivery of MDAs in revenue generation of the state.

The Chairman also recommended that the management of Lokoja international market and other government-owned markets be transferred to Kogi State Market Development Board for proper management and increase revenue generation without altering the ownership structure.

While seeking for approval that all revenue generated in the state should be paid to the automated KGIRS account, Mr Salami said that the recommendations if approved will go a long way in ensuring that MDAs in Kogi state do not only compete favourably with other states but would surpass the performance of other states in revenue generation and efficient service delivery, assuring that KGIRS would not relent in its effort to ensure that the state government meets all her obligations of providing dividends of democracy to the people of the state during its second term.

The highlight of the meeting was the approval of the twelve recommendations by Governor Yahaya Bello with a charge to the management of KGIRS to commence the implementation of the recommendations immediately.