By Emeka Anaeto

The Gombe State government has indicated that one of its priorities is attainment of self-reliant socio-economic development through plugging of revenue leakages, fiscal discipline and efficiency in Internally Generated Revenue, IGR.

Speaking to financial journalists last weekend in Gombe, the State’s Commissioner for Finance and Economic Development, Muhammad Gambo Magaji, said new laws and processes have been put in place since the present regime in the state assumed office two years ago to drive the agenda.

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He, however, lamented that the Stae government has been burdened by uncompleted projects as well as repayment of huge loans inherited from the previous administrations which presently puts sever pressure on the finances of the state.

He stated: ‘‘we had to promulgate a new law for States Inland Revenue Service to give it more strength to be able to earn more revenue.

‘‘Last year we recorded the highest ever internally generated revenue in the history of the state, and we have pledged to continue to move our IGR to levels that will ensure that Gombe becomes independent financially and economically.

‘‘What I mean is that we should be able to pay our salaries from our IGR; That is the dream of the Governor at the moment and that is what he has given us the mandate to ensure that by the end of his administration, Gombe is independent in terms of meeting all its current expenditure needs rather than waiting for Abuja to send us money through the federation account.

We had to do new things; We had to enhance revenue activities; We had to give incentives and more strength to IRS for them to perform their duties; We restructured the place; We brought in new people; Then we had to look at all the leakages because there are a lot of tax areas that we are not being looked at by the former administration and we felt we needed to enhance that.

‘‘Out of the N124 billion debt we inherited, most of it was in bank loans and bonds. We inherited three bonds from the past administration and we inherited liabilities.

‘‘But we have not relented in the repayment obligations. What we have continued to do is to pay these loans and continue to survive with what we are able to get.

‘‘However, we had to take new loans to meet the aspirations of the people. We have projects that are going on, a lot of roads and other infrastructure projects going on around the states and you cannot do these projects without funds.

‘‘What we discovered when we came in was that we have these three bonds that we are running and we are paying over N300 million every month on those bonds alone. We had other similar inherited payment obligations on facilities that are running which we are also paying. In fact this government inherited almost N900 million monthly on loan repayments.’’