Abia bares fangs on tax defaulting firms

In the determined bid to recover all withheld taxes due to Abia State government, over 1,000 business and office premises in the state risk being sealed by designated state high courts, to prosecute tax defaulters, as the state Board of Internal Revenue (BIR) bares its fangs on erring organisations.

Already, over 12 of such tax defaulter’s premises, comprising banks, research institutes, importers, factories, cement depots, among others, have been so sealed and suspended from business within the past two years.

Their offenses include not remitting or under-remitting their respective workers’ Pay As You Earn (PAYE) tax deductions and withholding taxes to the state within the legally stipulated time frame.

Chairman of the state’s BIR, Udochukwu Ogbonna told The Guardian that over 1,000 tax defaulters have been arraigned before the state designated high courts which have the statutory authority to order sealing of premises but decried the slow pace the courts attend to the prosecutions, saying “sealing and closure of premises is only effected on court orders as over 1,000 defaulter’s are facing the court”.

He spoke after the premises of three branches of a new generation bank- two at Aba and one at Umuahia: and Batawa Company – an MTN partner at Aba, were sealed by court bailiffs.

While the bank was said to have under-remitted to the state government the by N167.6 million, the MTN partner failed to remit N452,007.60, representing its due staff’s PAYE tax deductions.

According to the court orders issued by Justice K. O. Wosu in the case of the Batawa Company and Justice Onuoha Ogwe in the case of the bank, the defendants, in separate suites, were duly served with the demand notices for the remittance of their due sums but did not comply within the time stipulated by the demand notice.

He disclosed that some convicted Defaulters whose business premises were sealed in the past, applied to the Court for stay of execution of the Order saying that by implication they are asking the court to reverse itself.