FEAR GRIPS WORKERS AS LAGOS IGR DROPS TO N7 BILLION MONTHLY

By Our Reporter

October 28, 2015 – Lagos State Government today said that Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) has not dropped from N23 billion to N 7 billion contrary to rumour making the rounds.

A source close to Chairman of LIRS Mr. Olufolarin Ogunsanwo met with his staff in Ikeja to outline measures to boost revenue in the state.

According to the source, the chairman lamented that the 1,200 audit staff were not effective and threatened to downsize staff strength to 500.

He was alleged that those who will be left in the department would be staff with accounting background while others will be redeployed to lesser departments.

He blamed decreased of IGR from N23 billion to N7 billion on inefficiency of the staff.
The information caused jitters in government secretariat caused jitters amongst the civil servants who feared that over 50 percent of the workforce may be sacked from public service as a result of the rumoured colossal drop in its IGR.

But in a swift reaction to the development, the Chairman of LIRS Mr. Olufolarin Ogunsanwo who refused to give the current figure told journalists on a telephone conversation that contrary to the claim of decrease that its IGR is on the increase.

” At the meeting, we did not discuss anything like IGR. The meeting was not even held at CBD. We did not mention such thing at the meeting. There was no time that we mentioned such. There was never revenue drop. Everything about our IGR is intact by the special grace of God.
“The only thing I can tell you was that as at this time last month, what we have collected now is far higher than what we collected in the past months.”

He said all hands are presently on deck to boost the economic prosperity in the state and make life comfortable for the residents, saying people will voluntarily pay their tax if they have confidence in the system.

The Lagos IGR recorded a quantum leap from an average of N600 million to N 23 billion monthly and had remained at that staggering height for many years, sometimes coming as low as N18 Billion monthly depending on the economic trend.