APC accuses Fayose of tax burden on Ekiti people

THE All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ekiti State has accused Governor Ayodele Fayose of unleashing tax burden on the poor, saying his policies contrasted what he promised the people during electioneering campaigns.

In a statement at the weekend by its Publicity Secretary, Taiwo Olatubosun, the party noted that Fayose had turned Ekiti people to puns in political chess game, regretting that the people with prospects for successes in their callings had been turned into “babies without reason”.

“What we have experienced in the hands of Governor Ayodele Fayose is turning Ekiti people to babies without reason. He believes Ekiti people have no capacity for reasoning or that they have short memories and incapable of knowing their rights or that they can easily be incapacitated to insist on their rights.

“This we have seen in his reckless breaking of promises to the people in the last 10 months of his administration after running down his opponent’s life-lifting policies with the promise that Ekiti people’s lives would be better under his administration if voted into power,” Olatunbosun said.

He regretted that 10 months on, what Ekiti people saw was a reversal of fortunes under “an administration that has made deceits and lies as official policies of administration.”

He said: “Fayose promised market women freedom to ply their trades anywhere they wished, saying he would not bother them with taxes or running after them with the environmental task force to chase them away from their trading points.

“But today, Fayose is not only chasing them away from their trading points, he is also destroying their wares, including pepper and tomatoes, and also imposing unbearable taxes that the traders cannot afford if they are to make any profit in their trades while market women are also being dislodged from their stalls and heavy fees imposed on them to acquire stalls in the new market he is planning to build.

“How much do poor pepper and tomatoes market women make that the governor is asking them to pay the magnitude of taxes he is imposing on them?

The party, which added that Fayose’s breaking of promises to the people did not portray him as possessing the needed integrity to take Ekiti State to great heights, urged Ekiti people to remind the governor of his promises during campaigns and insist that he had responsibility to fulfil his campaign promises instead of imposing suffocating taxes on petty traders and creating conditions that would make life unbearable for them.