Stakeholders decry abuse of public resources, financial mismanagement

To minimize excessive abuse of public resources, the financial management system must be strengthened, while the government must carry out intensive economic reform to identify policy gaps, and bridge the holes that enable people to evade or undermine the collection of taxes.
 
These were part of the resolutions at a stakeholders’ dialogue on, Policies, Gaps and Alternatives in Fiscal Transparency in Private Sector Governance, organised by Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), and Transparency International (TI), with support from OXFAM’s country office in Nigeria.
 
They also urged policymakers to intensify efforts in looking for other sources of revenue that can ensure development in Nigeria.

Also, the government should block the areas where revenues are supposed to be collected and are not collected. For instance, the audit report clearly shows how the government is losing revenue,” he added.

CISLAC’s Programme Manager, Tax, Justice, Environment and Conservation of Nature, Chinedu Bassey, stressed the need to ensure that Nigeria’s financial management system is strengthened to forestall people from taking advantage of the loopholes and continue to steal and misappropriate resources that are meant for development. “These are the ways in which we can carve and minimize excessive abuse of public resources in Nigeria.”
 
On his part, Manage, Large Tax Audit, Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Iheme Madukairo, urged Nigerians who are in the habit of evading taxes to desist from such, saying the law will take its course.
  
“Enforcement is out there, sleeves are rolled up to do the job that we are mandated to do by the act and sooner or later, we will catch up with them. The sanctions have also increased by virtue of the finance act. The penalty has been increased, once it is found out that it is a deliberate act to breach the law, the law will take its course.”