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Showing posts from July, 2016

DESPERATION FOR INTERNALLY GENERATED REVENUE (IGR) & CITIZEN AMBUSH

Last week I had a taste of the renewed and intensified effort of The Lagos State government to increase its internally generated revenue. Lagos has long been acknowledged as perhaps the only State that can survive without Federation account. I understand that Ogun State is strongly on the heels of Lagos. During the reign of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as governor of Lagos, very strategic decisions were taken, to make Lagos financially viable and independent. The first was the lagos version of the Land Use act called Land use charge,which compelled all land owners to pay tax on their property across the state. This was stoutly resisted especially by the organized Private sector,leading to court cases. It was eventually resolved in favour of the State, following government's agreement to reduce the tax rate. Today this has become a major revenue for Lagos. So what oil should be for oil bearing states is what land is for Lagos! Then there was the sales tax, which again was fought by the busine

THIS IS GETTING SCARY,CAN ANYBODY TELL ME WHAT IS GOING ON?

I may be wrong but I believe that something is going wrong in the World. Any where you turn, there there is anger, there is violence. Almost everyday there is a new breaking news on Television about the break out of violence in one part of the World or the other. Global terrorism is growing daily and assuming unimaginable dimensions. Sectarian conflicts are growing and racial violence is resurgent. Human life is becoming meaningless all over the World. Are we loosing our humanity or are we coming to the close of the age or what really is happening?     In our Country, I am having increasing difficulty to understand what is happening.The Boko Haram Insurgents ravaged our Nation over the last six years, bombing, killing and maiming. Not satisfied with that, they began to take territory and threatened to overrun Northern Nigeria and possibly the entire Nation. What was their anger? No one could really say, though it was alleged that they hated western education and wanted to turn Niger

DECLINING NATIONAL PRODUCTIVITY, PUBLIC HOLIDAYS AND THE CHANGE DEFICIT

Nigeria is technically in a recession. Gross Domestic product plunged from 6.3% growth in 2014 to 2.7% in 2015. Specifically it went from 2.84% in Q3 2015 to 2.11 in Q4 2015 and then dropped off the Clive to -0.36% in Q1 2016. So without waiting for the official Q2 2016 report which is not expected to do much better, we have had two consecutive quarters of GDP decline. National productivity which rose between 2010 and 2014, began a decline in Q1 2015 and has maintained this course up to date. In the component of Labour productivity, Nigerians are known to be hardworking but productivity of its labour force is often questioned. The labour productivity in emerging Countries like Russia($24) Brazil ( $10.7) and turkey($28.9)is much higher than Nigeria's. In Q4 2015, Nigeria's labour productivity declined to $3.55 from $3.86 in Q3 2015 and the decline has continued since then approaching the 2011 level of $2.98 or less  The fall in GDP is blamed on the precipitate fall in the p

DIFFERENTIATING BETWEEN AREA BOYS, OMONILES & STREET HAWKERS

 Last week, I was driving down the Mobalaji Bank- Anthony Road in Ikeja, Lagos, when I noticed some confusion around the vicinity. I heard some shouting and then I saw some people running towards where we were. I noticed that they were Street hawkers- those young men and women who sell Bottled and canned drinks, packaged food, chewing gum, sweets, boiled groundnuts, newspapers & magazines, handekerchiefs, windshield wipers and sundry items to commuters any where the traffic slows down. I wondered what was amiss. Then I saw some men wearing long sleeved green shirts on brown trousers, with beret caps on their heads, armed with long sticks, pursuing and beating the fleeing Street hawkers. I asked who are this? and my driver said, they were KAI Operatives. That they pursue street hawkers, seize their wares which they often confiscate or they extort money from them in order to release the goods. I shook my head in sympathy and continued our snarl down the road.   A few minutes after