By Felix Oguejiofor Abugu
One of the highlights of Obi Cubana’s recent 50th birthday celebrations was a cash gift of N100m presented to the hospitality industry guru by a man described as an ‘Alamra’ businessman. Besides that, a lot of other cash gifts simply rained. Is there, or should there not be, a system in place in Idemili South in Anambra to directly tax such huge sums collected in one day, at one place and by one person, under the protection of a local government, even if it is just to defray the cost of deploying Agunechemba to secure the venue and attendees of the party?
By the same token, shouldn’t Nnewi South Local Government have benefitted financially from the burial of Mr. Cletus Uzoezie Oragwa (ZENCO), the Tecno tycoon’s boss whose mother’s casket reportedly cost a princely N1bn? We saw Zenco collect bundles of crisp naira notes from mourners and give same back to some lucky people around him: it was another time for naira rain in a part of the state with the highest number of billionaires per capita in Nigeria. Out of so much, would it have been out of place for Nnewi South to directly collect a token to enable it, if not for anything else, at least to defray the cost of deploying personnel of Agunechemba to secure mourners and the burial venue (even if symbolically, since ZENCO and Cubana would have made higher security arrangements fortheir high-profile events anyway)?
Would any token levying of the aforementioned social events by the local councils concerned for the reasons given be considered “harsh tax” by any stretch of the imagination?
Now consider the fuss that has been made in Igbo-Eze North LGA, Enugu State, over a N50,000 burial/marriage levy by the council – N30,000 of which goes back to the community through the Igwe for the Neighbourhood Watch’s ‘logistics’, and N20,000 to the LG as token IGR
I write against the backdrop of what seems to be an orchestrated social media campaign against the leadership of the one-town (Enugu-Ezike) Igbo-Eze North LGA, Enugu State, for adopting the recommendation of an economic /revenue mobilisation committee it set up, with membership drawn from across the political divide, to introduce the above levies. Without explaining the principle behind the levies or even stating the correct amounts involved, thereby correctly informing its readers, citizen journalism went to town, tagging the levies “harsh tax”, dubbing the local government’s leadership the worst so far and demanding that the “harsh tax” be rescinded or the Chairman be chased out.
Enugu-Ezike may not have media-savvy tycoons whose social events tend to trend on social media, but burials and marriages in this sprawling 36-village town (reputed as the largest in West Africa, outside Ibadan, which is more cosmopolitan), are also heavy, quite heavy.
Until recently, high-profile, not to add loud, burials, marriages, birthdays and other celebrations by wealthy, not so wealthy and or average families, had been largely muted, no thanks to the activities of goons unleashed on society by dreaded politicians who refused to pay those goons after using them as political thugs. With enough arms and ammunition to level the whole town, the goons, who soon broke into factions, some for and others against the dreaded politicians, practically held the town hostage, sparking the worst sit-at-home experience of any town in Igboland for all of two years. While it lasted, the security situation Igbo-Eze North was simply horrifying, so horrifying, in fact, that political leadership, including traditional leadership, was all but run out of town, with almost ALL local government executives living in Enugu and rarely coming to work in the LGA.
But amidst all this, the former Chairman of the LGA, Engr. Ejike Itodo, deploying rare peace-building capabilities, with the active support of the State government of course, managed to resolve the crisis and return peace and security in Igbo-Eze North. To sustain the peace and security dividends in Igbo-Eze North (IGN), the government initiated the formation of Neighbourhood Watch security outfits in all the 20 wards of the LGA, whereupon the communities, elated at the ‘return of life and living’ in their domains, elected to fund the outfits by themselves. That is how it came to be that communities in IGN paid for the training of their vigilantes by the police, for their legally-permitted arms and ammunition and their salaries as well.
Excited at inheriting a peaceful, secure environment to operate in, the current local government leadership under Engr. Uchenna Ogalla, decided to expand, as it were, the frontiers of the peace and security dividends in IGN by taking over the payment of the vigilantes’ salaries throughout the LGA. Needless to say, this went a long way in reducing the burden of managing the security outfits on the communities.
One of the ways by which the communities tried to manage and sustain their own outfits, besides voluntary and mandatory contributions by stakeholders, was to levy people burying their dead and or families marrying their daughters out or bringing in new daughters-in-law. In some communities, such levies were as high as N70,000 and in some others as low as N20,000.
At the recommendation of the economic/revenue mobilisation committee, after due consultations with the Igwes and town union leaders, the local government chairman, Engr. Ogalla approved the harmonization of the levies at N50,000 across board. According to the arrangement, N30,000 is given back to the community through the Igwes to provide ‘logistics’ for the vigilantes, while N20,000 is returned to the government as token IGR to help it in mobilizing resources for the payment of vigilantes’ salaries.
There couldn’t be a more progressive taxation than the above, could there?
As a veteran of over 30 decades, I know enough about journalism to insist that its most sacred duty is to properly, not to add factually, inform and educate the reading or listening public. Where journalism misinforms, especially deliberately, it only creates a recipe for disaster in society. And while opinions/comments are free, facts, another of journalism’s mantra holds, are sacred.
But, it is as if citizen journalism does not believe in the sacredness of facts or in the imperative of properly informing or educating its publics. It takes opinion as fact and insists on its incontrovertibility, even inviolability. Citizen journalism is wedded to controversy and antagonism. While journalists are expected to be eternally vigilant, even skeptical, about government’s moves, they are not supposed to be completely fiendish.
One of the claims by citizen journalism about the IGN “harsh tax” saga is that those building “upstairs” are made to cough out N1m to government and those building “bungalows” are made to pay N500k. Which is a false and twisted narrative bandied about for whatever that motives. In Enugu-Ezike where some people build N50-100m mansions or eye-popping, ‘chop-money’ bungalows, would it be too much for the LG to demand N150-200k land use charge for “upstair” and N50-100k for “bungalow”, part of the money that would be used by the government to develop say access roads to those edifices?
Taxation is a legitimate source of revenue for government, indeed, about its only source of revenue. What citizens often demand is that taxation be progressive – higher for high income earners and lower for low-income earners. As has been explained, what is happening in Enugu State is that the government while the government may be aggressively widening the tax net, it certainly is not increasing the tax burden on citizens.
And so, let the readers judge: in the light of the foregoing, is there a “harsh tax” regime in Igbo-Eze North, bad enough to warrant citizen journalism’s call for the chasing away of the LG’s leadership? Is there no sense at all in the principle behind the above taxes (levies actually)?
Why am I writing so involved? Because I am a leader in my community and I knew how much of a burden it was becoming to mobilize resources from among our people to pay our vigilantes’ monthly salaries before our political the good news came that the local government chairman had taken over payment of the our boys’ salaries.
So, when some people distort facts and write so disdainfully about an obviously well-considered policy action of, in my view, a pragmatic, even benevolent, local government administration, one cannot but smell a rat: here comes, so early in the day, the usual journalistic, even intellectual hubris, of one side of the political divides in IGN.
This tendency to often gaslight governance actions taken by the local government chairman’s part of town and, if you will, my own part of town too, must stop.
If it is of any moment, my advice to IGN is, do not let anyone or group pressure you into abandoning a well considered socio-economic decision which the people, in the long run, might look back and exclaim “ah but these people were right all along; they actually meant well”. All the administration in IGN needs to do to win over the people is simply to be honest and transparent about its doings; it must not succumb to pressure to abandon its well-considered decisions that are certain to serve the interest of the people and residents of Igbo-Eze North well.
