13-12-2024.

Former Governor of Cross River State, Professor Ben Ayade’s scholarship was not in vain, it has taught him how to be humble and serve the citizens to the best of his ability with humility. He had not been your typical number one citizen of a state. He did not, nor does he, lap up any policy from the nation’s seat of power without assessing its impact on the people of the state. 

That is why he told the people to refuse to give any federal official any tax that is not already domesticated in the state. He said there was absolutely no point in increasing the burden on petty business people, instead of easing their hardship. He added that government was about easing, not increasing the hardship of citizens.

In an emotion laden address to members of some community leaders, the professor categorically instructed the people in the state NOT to give tax to the official of the Board of Internal Revenue (FBIR) if they ask for it. He believed he had failed the people of the state as it were, so it would be very unfair of him to allow them to suffer more. He added that expecting the “poor citizens who eke out a living from their petty trading” to give to the government what they do not have is a shameful and irresponsible thing to do.

Most of the governors protested against the tax reform bill only because it would reduce the states’s monthly taking from the FG, which would in turn affect what they would get (steal) from it. That is what most of them do best, but not serving the people who the money belongs to.

That is also the belief of Margret Thatcher, when she was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (UK. She opposed many taxes on the citizens , because she believed that nations do not grow richer by levying more taxes on the citizens. 

As Prime Minister of Britain, the Iron Lady, as she was popularly known, once asserted that “No nation ever grew more prosperous by taxing its citizens beyond their capacity to pay”.

So is a serving Senator in the United States (US),

who told a television audience that the only way the West could assist the poor african countries is no tax and the cancellation of all the debt owed to them by the poor African countries

The Senator stated before the surprised presenter and the audience that, “The poor can never repay their debts, and forgiveness by developed countries will not help the poor country. We should forgive the debts, even though that is not going to help very much. What will however, help is tax cuts.

“Poor African countries have the lowest wage workers in the world, and yet companies like Nike, for instance, can’t put a factory in those countries because of the oppressive tax rate. Taxes have killed any possibility of economic development. They killed any hope of these countries ever helping themselves, and which leaves them completely at the mercy of charity and loans. 

“And here is the worst part. You know why those countries have such high tax rates? Because of us. To show us that they can raise enough money to pay back their loans. But TAXES CAN’T RAISE ANY MONEY IF THEY KILL THE ECONOMY. So it turns out that the tragic unintended consequences of our good intentions toward Africa, our kindness, is that we have encouraged them to lock themselves into a GRUESOME ECONOMIC DEPRESSION.

Even Ghana, a fellow West Africa country reduces, not increase, the taxes that are paid to the government, believing that it is the only way to encourage, entice and attract companies and businesses, both minor and major, to invest in the country.

But President Tinubu even believes in exhorting the living for the gains of the federal government, by taxing the wealth left by the dead before it is shared to inheritors. The proposal to that effect was included in the contentious ‘Tax Bill’ forwarded to the National Assembly. The regime wanted the unwanted and unpopular tax bill RAMRODDED to the citizens, adding to the excruciating burden that is already unbearable in the country. 

What is more, the money to be realised from the new tax would end up in the pockets of the president, other CORRUPT officials of the present regime, the ‘elected’ members of the National Assembly (NASS) and cronies, clerics and praise singers of the power brokers in the country.

Approving such a bill by an Assembly whose members are mostly professed believers of God, would have offended sincere Muslims, as God did not include the government as one of the beneficiaries of a dead person’s wealth. And God Knows best. Death duty (Tax) is the practice of the Godless West.

Tinubu’s wants to ape all the bad practices taught to him by his godless masters, in the US, UK and France, among others, and impose them on the citizens of Nigeria. Nigerians appear least in the thinking of the President, unless it has anything to do with more money into his bottomless pockets, or the increment of hardship on them.

May God receive the leadership of Nigeria from the so called leaders the country has, and give it to the likes of Professor Ben Ayade to pilot her affairs from the top. The present president does not appear to care whether the citizens he serves, live or die, as long as he serves his Western masters to their satisfaction, and fills his pockets with money.

Malumfashi wrote from Katsina.