Akintola Benson
1 January 2009
column
Lagos — HE said that it was the recognition of such possibilities that informed the hardline position being taken against the activities of illegal dredgers and miners. "In Lagos today, mining and dredging activities are the exclusive rights of the state government.
Beyond that, even if one is living within the waterfront, such a person does not have the liberty of reclaiming or dredging any portion of the lagoon or the ocean for any reason without recourse to the government for permission," said Oniru, who said that such property would be forfeited to the state.
According to Adeyemi Adepetu, the governor, however, said that the state "cannot comfortably make a total annual budget in excess of N403billion. This amount is to cater not only for capital expenditure but also for personnel, maintenance and other recurrent costs". He stated that the revenue allocated to Lagos State in Abuja is barely 10 per cent of the budgeted amount.
"Our primary source of revenue and meeting this is through taxation," he stated. Governor Fashola said that all over the world, governments rely on tax contributions for survival and progress, reason why every resident who is gainfully employed is constitutionally bound to pay tax, which perhaps, according to him, was a moral duty.
He, however, lamented the way some people had mis-interpreted his administrations multiple taxation. The Lagos State Governor, commenting on claims that the government was inflicting hardship on the state's residents by introducing many taxes, said: "I must disagree with you because there is a constitutional problem here and the burden cannot be placed on our door".
He noted, however, that each tier of government had constitutionally specified taxes to collect from residents. He added that tenement rates were to be collected by local governments, income taxes by the state government and company taxes by the Federal Government.
According to him, the Federal Government must also tax you to be able to maintain the aviation and other infrastructure, while the local governments would need our money to maintain or build more stalls.
He added that trading and small businesses were the bedrock or engine room of Lagos State's economy and that it was on that record that all small businessmen, traders, artisans, market men and women constitute a very large percentage of the state's population, while it is the state's responsibility to provide social goods to all and sundry.
"Our records show clearly that those who enjoy most the free health, free education, free legal services provided by the government are the small businessmen, traders, artisans, market women and men who are around today, therefore there is need for your cooperation to achieve this by making sure you pay taxes regularly," he stressed.
On the enormity of reclamation exercise which had taken place and the subsequent projects earmarked for the various proposed schemes, the commissioner said that such exercise was not peculiar to Nigeria, citing Malaysia, Dubai and other countries where shorelines were reclaimed for such projects as housing, hotels, bridges and related structures without any known calamity associated with their construction.
"Climate change has proved that nothing can be guaranteed, or taken for granted. Even, in the most advanced countries of the world, the unexpected are happening. The only difference is their response to such happenings which allows little damage, unlike in Nigeria where disaster management is still low," said Kaditi.
Governor Fashola, made a strong case for the improvement of the processes of land administration, rather than a repeal of the Land Use Act. According to Mudiaga Affe, Governor Fashola spoke in Abuja while chairing Session Five on "Land Reform as a Catalyst for Residential and Commercial Mortgage Growth", during a conference on financing the Seven-Point Agenda of the Federal Government through the capital markets. He added that though many people have canvassed for its repeal, the Land Use Act has no major fundamental defect but has been hampered mainly through the way it is being administered.
As contained in a statement from his Senior Special Assistant on Media, Mr. Hakeem Bello, the governor disclosed that Lagos has come to terms with some of the criticisms of the operation of the Land Use Act in the issuance of consent, which the state has worked on innovatively to make the system work faster. Fashola said that part of the innovation brought about by the administration is the institution of a 30-day consent period, during which, if all the documents are complete, consent is issued within 30 days.
He admitted that the state is not where it ought to be, but had made remarkable progress from where it was, such that the present administration has continued to delegate powers of signing consents to at least four commissioners in order to make the process faster. He said the operation of the Land Registry in Lagos has been fine-tuned to ensure that it is no longer accessible to members of the public in terms of the Certificate of Occupancy, as only authorized people can have physical contact with the C of Os.
The governor said as of today, the Land Registry now has at least seven million pages of land titles and C of Os all scanned, which can be accessed through electronic means without tampering with the documents.
He lamented that Nigeria is sitting on a lot of dead capital in form of land, because the society has refused to allow its land processes to evolve in a formal manner, where it can become an instrument of international trade and transaction; and can tap into formal structures that already exist in the developed world.
He said: "If you look at all the wealth of the First World today, it is locked down in lands and therefore, whenever there is a major crises in the value of land, there is a serious ripple effect in the whole economy and the recession we are seeing in the United States today is not totally attributable to power as it is to the challenges of mortgage in that economy".
He said how well Nigerians see land will determine whether it remains a Third World nation or cross to the First World class. In his contribution, the Chairman of the Security and Exchange commission, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, asserted that the Land Use Act is an impediment which should be reviewed, by taking it out of the Constitution and made a regular act that can be amended when the need arises.
Also, the Director-General of the Nigerian Stock Exchange, Prof. Ndi Okereke-Onyiuke, promised to ensure that the SEC convenes a conference of governors where Governor Fashola would make a presentation on tackling some of the thorny issues of land reforms in Nigeria .
I will conclude this write-up with the words of Governor Fashola: ... " Lagos was a city of 500,000 people in the late 1960s, and home to three million by 1975. It currently stands at 17.8 million, and is still growing at an average of 5 percent per year. Sadly, since Lagos ceased to be the political capital of Nigeria , its infrastructure has not risen to respond to the growing population. There's a huge gap that needs to be filled in the form of roads, railways, and ferries, but also in areas of healthcare, education and sports facilities.
"We want to restore Lagos as a trading post, the financial headquarters of Nigeria , and the business and service centre of West Africa . As a government, we have started with a very ambitious budget for this year, of N403 billion(US $3bn), the largest ever budget for any Nigerian state. We have committed 60 percent of that to capital projects, largely infrastructure".
Mr. Benson, a lawyer is Senior SA to Governor Fashola of Lagos State.
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