Plateau Targets N21.6bn IGR for 2021

By Ahmed Rahma

Plateau State government has declared that it was planning to generate the sum of N21.6 billion as Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) for the year 2021.

This was made know by the Chairman of the Plateau State Internal Revenue Service (PSIRS), Mr Dashe Arlat, on Wednesday.

At the press briefing in Jos, Mr Arlat disclosed that the agency has adopted a strategy called Explosive Revenue Drive 2021 to meet this revenue goal.

He further stated that PSIRS will embark on massive taxpayers registration, increased revenue assessment, taxpayer representatives approach, collecting agent and revenue agent registration among others.

According to him, with the challenges the nation was battling with due to COVID-19 pandemic, there is the need for government and the people to brace up and confront the present reality.

“With the challenge posed with the COVID-19 pandemic and the unprecedented drop of oil prices that had resulted in drop in statutory revenue allocation to the state.

“There is an urgent need for government and citizens to brace up and confront the present realities of the harsh economic climate that will enable them to look inwards and take advantage of any activity that is income yielding to ensure that revenues are enhanced and collected amidst the pandemic to keep the wheels of government turning in order to meet the needs of the people,” the Chairman said.

He added that, “The 2021 strategies and policy direction of the service will be in pursuant to section 40 of the Plateau state consolidation law 2020.

“So far, over 500,000 taxpayers have been captured by the service but more are going to be captured this year.

“With 4.39 million population in Plateau State and a projection of 1.56 million taxable adults, we are hopeful that we will meet the IGR target of N21.6 billion for the year 2021.”

He urged the people to cooperate with the agency to enable it to meet it’s obligations while assuring them that a post-pandemic strategy must be developed and deployed to ensure business activities resume seamlessly in the state after the pandemic has abated.