FIRS: Presidency opens up on Fowler removal

The Presidency has said that Babatunde Fowler’s tenure as chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), was not renewed because of his inability to generate enough revenue for the country.

Fowler, whose term of office expired on December 9, 2019, was replaced by Muhammad Nami.

President Muhammadu Buhari’s Senior Special Assistant on Media, Garba Shehu, while speaking with journalists at the weekend in Abuja, also said that it was not wrong for the federal government to borrow more money to finance infrastructure in the country.

“It is not a scandal to borrow, the bad thing about borrowing is when you deployed it to your pocket. This has happened in the past in this country, President Buhari is borrowing to do railway, to do East-West expressway, to do second Niger bridge, to do Mabilla power, to do Abuja-Kano expressway, to do Ajaokuta-Abuja gas pipeline.

“These are projects that are beneficial to the economy, these are basic infrastructure projects – railway, power – without which this country cannot achieve development.

"So, if you ask me, from my own understanding, the problem we have in this country is the revenue issue. We have a revenue problem because we are unable to generate as much money as it is needed to do more capital infrastructure and also service debt.

“Because of the low revenue earnings, people look at the size of our debt repayment and they scream. But government is doing something about this and I’m happy you have seen the change that has happened in FIRS, give them a chance, let see how they would perform. Government is optimistic that things will look upward and the revenue will improve. And once there is inflow that is sufficient to do a lot of these things, we may not even need to borrow,” Shehu said.

Comments

Hurricane Hits Texas, One Person Reported Dead

Hurricane Harvey hit Texas as a Category 4 storm on Friday, battering the coast with 130-mph winds and torrential rain. It was the strongest hurricane to hit the United States in more than a decade leaving a massive destruction, loss of electricity, wrecked buildings and has so far killed at least one person. Scroll down to see more pictures of the incident:

Kenyan Law Court dismisses case of man seeking compensation after his wife eloped with another man from hospital

A lawsuit filed by a man seeking to be compensated by St Mary's Mission Hospital in Kenya for allowing his wife to leave the hospital with another man after giving birth, has been struck out by a law court. The appellant had sued the St. Mary's Mission hospital at Kakamega law courts in 2020 seeking general damages from the facility on grounds that the hospital had discharged his wife and allowed her to leave with another man. After delivering and at the time of discharge, the wife of the appellant claimed he was the baby's father. The court of appeal judges Patrick Kiage, Mumbi Ngugi and Francis Tuiyott sitting at the Kisumu Court of Appeal, empathized with the man, but disagreed that he (the appellant) be compensated by the hospital for not detaining his wife. They upheld the lower court's judgement which added that there's no remedy that lies in the law for such grievances. Kiage said; "I agree that if a man takes the woman he loves to t...

Togo prime Minister Komi Klassou resigns

Togo’s prime minister and his government have resigned, the West African nation’s presidency said late Friday. President Faure Gnassingbe congratulated prime minister Komi Selom Klassou and his team for their “economic, political and social efforts and the encouraging results despite the health crisis around the world”, a statement on the presidency’s official website said. Togo has been due for a political reshuffle since Gnassingbe was reelected in February for a fourth term in office, but changes were delayed by the coronavirus pandemic. The president’s election win, which came after a constitutional change allowing him to run, extended more than a half-century of dynastic rule over the former French colony by the Gnassingbe family. The victory was disputed by the main opposition challenger, who has faced official harassment in the wake of the vote. The president has led the country of eight million people since taking over in 2005 following the death of his father Gnass...

BAMY BLOG

Search This Blog