Press Releases

Lagos 2008 Great Leap Budget On Course - Fashola

Apr 18, 2008 - The Lagos State 2008 Great Leap Budget is well on course, the State Governor, Mr. Babatunde Fashola (SAN), revealed on Friday in Lagos .

Fielding questions from Government House Correspondents after presiding over the State’s first ever Quarterly Budget Review which took place at the new Lagos House, Alausa, Fashola said the Budget was on course but needs adequate funding to achieve its target.

The Governor said the budget focus remains roads and infrastructure development, transportation, environment, health, education, water, and public service reform

Governor Fashola therefore, called on individuals and organizations operating in the State to be tax compliant insisting that tax remained the key strategy for the development of any nation.

Fashola, who said the State Government would leave no stone unturned in its efforts to ensure effective tax collection system in the State, explained that the decision to renew the performance of the Budget quarterly was borne out of the need to ensure effective implementation.

According to him, a quarterly review (as opposed to half-yearly) would afford the administration the opportunity to discover and nip in the bud any lapse in the implementation process before it affects the whole process.

On the outcome of the meeting, Fashola said the budget has done well so far, pointing out however, that there was need to be more aggressive in the internally generated revenue drive.

The Governor said the State Government intends to achieve an 80 percent performance of the budget pointing out that no country has ever achieved a 100 percent budget implementation.

“No government has ever achieved 100 percent budget implementation. The 2007 budget achieved 70 percent implementation. We want to beat that this year” the Governor said.

Also fielding question from correspondents after the meeting, the State’s Commissioner for Budget and Planning, Mr. Ben Akabueze said one area that the Executive Council harped on at the meeting was the internally generated revenue which major source according to him is tax.

Akabueze declared; “As we have always said at every opportunity. What we are doing is implementing existing tax laws of the State. We have not made any new tax laws”.

He reiterated the call for special consideration for Lagos in the sharing of funds from the Federation Account pointing out that even when considered on the basis of derivation, Lagos State harbors 75 percent of the commercial activities from which the Federal Revenue is derived.

“The Principle of Derivation should be extended to all revenue generating activities which include commercial activities more than 70 percent of industries in Nigeria operate from Lagos . They use the infrastructures provided by the Lagos State Government but they pay tax to the Federal Government”, the Commissioner said.

Citing the Value Added Tax (VAT) as an example, Akabueze said this was all others in revenue generation for the Federal Government. “But we get nothing as compensation for this” he lamented.

On the budget, the Commissioner said it has performed creditably well so far, adding that with effective monitoring and sufficient funding from stakeholders fulfilling their part of the social contract by paying taxes when due., the budget would achieve its goal.