Former Ekiti State Governor Segun Oni and the state government yesterday disagreed over the collection of land use charge.
He advised the government to reverse its decision on the tax policies, saying Ekiti people could not bear such burden under the prevailing economic situation.
The ex-governor, in a statement by the Director of Media and Publicity of Segun Oni Movement, Adebayo Jackson, said the ‘unwise decision’ would subject already impoverished Ekiti residents to hardship and make life unbearable for them.
He accused the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led government of deliberately imposing tax policies on the people to mop up fund for the June 18 governorship election.
Oni said any attempt to shift the blame of the new tax policy on him would be resisted, adding that Ekiti people were fed up with obnoxious policies of the current administration.
He alleged that the state government, in an attempt to wriggle out of the protest by the masses, decided to blackmail his government of initiating the policy before he was removed in 2010.
“In an attempt to wriggle out of the protest, the government decided to blackmail the then Segun Oni government of initiating the policy before he was removed.
“So, it is evident that the APC-led government is becoming jittery, as they are meeting brick wall in selling their candidate to the Ekiti the people, hence, their desperation to blackmail Oni, whom they consider to be their major problem in the race.
“We want to state categorically that at no time did Oni ever contemplate imposing any additional tax during his tenure, let alone such an unbearable tax like this.”
But, the Chairman of Ekiti State Board of Internal Revenue Service, Mr. Muyiwa Ogunmilade, debunked the claims that the tax was meant to extort the people, saying the land use charge was signed into law in 2013 to scale up the state’s revenue base.
He said tax payment had become a way of generating more revenue to provide infrastructure and social services for the people, adding that Ekiti had one of the best and affordable land use charge in the country.
“The tax used to be called tenement rate, neighbourhood improvement levy and grant rent in the past. But now, the government has abolished the three taxes and introduced land use charge that is being shared between the state and local governments.
“All the states of the federation enacted the law for over a decade ago, which Ekiti has just started now.”