Ugwuanyi Urges MDAs to Restrategise on Meeting Revenue Targets

Enugu State Governor, Mr. Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi has enjoined ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) to raise their performance bar and re-strategise on meeting their revenue targets as contained in the approved 2022 budget of the state.

Ugwuanyi also urged the MDAs to set up monitoring mechanisms that would track all revenue generated by them towards the actualisation of their targets.

Speaking while declaring open a one-day summit on achieving Enugu State Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) target for 2022 Fiscal year, held at Enugu on Tuesday, a statement yesterday quoted the governor to have canvassed the establishment of an annual revenue index of every MDA in the state.

Represented by the Secretary to the State Government, Prof. Simon Uchenna Ortuanya, Ugwuanyi was said to have stressed the importance of the summit to identify the challenges faced by poorly performing MDAs and deliberate on ways to improve on their activities with a view to meeting the 2022 revenue target for funding of the budget.

Stressing the state government’s determination towards growing its IGR to create a socio-economic system not so dependent on federal allocation, Ugwuanyi disclosed that his administration had grown the state’s IGR by 50 per cent without any increased tax burden on the people or businesses.

“Furthermore, a 2019 Report showed Enugu State as third in the federation after Lagos and River states in terms of fiscal sustainability. Also, a report by Ernst and Young, a globally acclaimed auditing firm, rated Enugu State first in the Federation on grounds of fiscal discipline, prudence and accountability,” he added.

The governor commended the Chairman of Enugu State Internal Revenue Service (ESIRS), Emeka Odo and his team for the summit, expressing confidence that, at the end of the strategic meeting, the challenges faced by major revenue generating MDAs would be analysed and solutions proffered to enhance revenue generation for delivery of more democratic dividends to the people of the state.

In his welcome address, Odo explained that the summit was organised by the agency in collaboration with Enugu State Economic Planning Commission to review the performance of the MDAs in the past three years, inform each revenue generating MDA of its revenue target for 2022, and formulate and agree on strategies for achieving the targets as well as harmonize their revenue heads.

Odo who applauded Ugwuanyi for the performance of ESIRS last year, revealed that the agency collected a total IGR of N26,700,000 as against a target of N29,000,000 as contribution of IGR to the funding of the 2021 budget, representing a 92 per cent budget performance and a 13 per cent improvement over that of the 2020 fiscal year.

According to the Chairman, “This performance is commendable and all of us in this room have every reason to be proud of this achievement. However, the bulk of the credit for the improving IGR figures in Enugu State goes to Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, considering the huge financial, structural and logistic support you have extended not only to the revenue service but to all revenue generating MDAs in the state.”