By Mumini Abdulkareem
The Kwara State government has been called upon to mandate ministries, parastatals and agencies to come up with action plan to quicken development post Covid-19 period in the state
A Prof of Economic, University of Ilorin, Gafar Ijaiya made the call at the weekend in a chat with Pilot Business to appraised the economy of the state in the post Covid-19 period.
According to him, the Governor should mandate ministries, parastatals and agencies to come up with their action plan developed by each ministry based on the budget provision for easy performance.
This, he noted, is key and should be decentralised to quicken development adding that there was need to expand the revenue base by bringing more people into the tax net especially from the informal sectors which constitute the bulk of the state’s tax payers.
He said providing incentives for those in the informal sectors whether in cash or kind to boost their businesses is a sure way of getting them to pay their tax.
“At times I wonder what is wrong with those in government that they cannot understand this simple circuit that paying tax is so easy and simple. It’s a simple theory of circular flow of income”, he added.
The University don further noted that coronavirus has forced review of budget across the country because of the crash of oil price in the international market which is our main parameter for the budget.
He therefore supported the long time clamour for the government to stop the use of oil price as a parameter for our budgeting system since we don’t have control over it.
Speaking on the effect of the covid-19 pandemic in the state, Ijaiya said Kwara is not a state in isolation and most respond to the issue positively by rescaling its priorities.
He said the last one year of this government in Kwara is a period of identification to see what is actually wrong and how do we get out of it.
“This is my view as an economist and not a politician. What this government has done so far is for the collective goods unlike those clamouring for the individual goods because they fought for the victory of the party at the polls and must be compensated. So far, we have roads construction school and hospital rehabilitation, water supply resuscitation along where the water taps are although we don’t have that in Tanke. Ordinarily we should begin to feel the impact of this government from this year but unfortunately Covid came in and so its going to be difficult to access. But I think the only thing is to look at the document and through the action say whether it is on the part of development or not. And from the budget presented this year which gave priority to infrastructure and human resources development, it shows there is a direction which we are beginning to see.
“The emphasis on human resources and capital development in the budget should remain and government should build more roads in both rural and urban to develop the agricultural and economic aspect of the state”, he added.
