The Plateau Government on Monday said it generated N3.96 billion from internal revenue sources between January and June, this year.
Samuel Pam, the Chairman of the state Internal Revenue Service, stated this on Monday when he spoke to the News Agency of Nigeria in Jos.
He said that the amount was reasonable, “even though it fell short of the expectation of the state government.”
“We are not satisfied with what we generated within half of this year, but we hope to step up more efforts to generate more revenue.
“As you can see, I have just assumed duty as the chairman of the service, and I hope to inject new ideas and strategies toward a better performance so as to meet our target for the year, 2013,” he declared.
The chairman said N2.8 billion, being the bulk of the revenue generated, came from the Pay-as-You-Earn, while N1.18 billion was generated by ministries, department and agencies.
He assured that the service would explore more areas of revenue to support the government in its efforts to execute development projects across the state.
“Our duty is to ensure that all taxes are duly and promptly paid so as to boost the revenue base of the state for the provision of more social amenities. We, the staffers of the service, have resolved that it won’t be business as usual, but would ensure that all tax payers pay their dues as expected.
“We would not hesitate to prosecute any tax defaulter, more so that we have began prosecuting some institutions and individuals at the Federal and State High Courts,” he said.
Mr. Pam urged the public not to relent in paying their taxes, saying that taxes greatly help in stimulating and entrenching growth and development.
(NAN)
