FCTA to tax properties in Abuja

By Ikechukwu Okaforadi

Except for withholding of assent by President Goodluck Jonathan, the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) will henceforth collect tax on every property, with the exception of those owned by government or its agencies in the city.

This followed the passage for third reading of the Bill sponsored by the chairman of the Senate Committee on FCT, Smart Adeyemi, establishing FCT Inland Revenue Board by the Senate yesterday.

The Bill, which aims at generating revenue for the development of the city, however granted freedom to the Minister of FCT to grant tax exemption on any property dims fit.

The Bill, if signed into law, will among others provide an opportunity for the Minister to freeze or confiscate any property defaulting in this payment.

Meanwhile, some special properties like schools, embassies, churches and mosques, buildings for traditional rulers and official residences of state governors, among others, were exempted from the tax by the Bill.

At the resumed consideration of the Bill, the clauses were debated, during which some of the senators pointed out some few observations, which were corrected before it was finally passed for third reading.

Earlier speaking on the Bill, the committee chairman, Smart Adeyemi said, “This is one of the first bills that the Senate is passing for the FCT. The bill empowers the FCT to have a revenue board.

“Don’t forget that since the creation of the capital city, we have never had a revenue board in place, and that explains why the FCT administration has all along been focusing on the national budget to meet the needs challenges of FCT.

“With the coming of the board in place, FCT would be able to generate revenue internally and that will help to augment what is coming from the federation account.

“In this year’s national budget, FCT has just about N30billion, although we have statutory allocation which is about 250billion. But from this board, when it is established and fully operational and it spreads its tentacles for internally generated revenue, we expect that additional sum not less than N100 billion would be generated from FCT annually,” he said.