The Oodua Consultative Forum (OCF), has asked President Muhammadu Buhari and the National Assembly to earmark “at least 20% of all Value Added Tax (VAT) accruable to the Federation Accounts from the South-West to the infrastructural development of Yorubaland.
President-General Worldwide, OCF, Prince Adebisi Oyemade, made this call in a media statement issued in Abeokuta, Ogun State.
The OCF, which lamented the dilapidated state of federal infrastructure in the South West and the helplessness of the region’s governors to tackle the problem owing to paucity of funds, suggested that “the proposed 20% derivation from VAT could be routed through the proposed South West Development Commission, which the South West senators and House representatives are currently seeking to establish through a bill now tabled before the National Assembly.”
Prince Oyemade wrote: “The 20%, which should be applicable to all regions in the country from the VAT collected from each region, should be deductible as first-line charge and without prejudice to the current sharing formula of VAT revenue.”
The OCF lamented that most federal roads in the South West are in “deplorable conditions.” It listed these to include the “Abeokuta-Sango-Lagos expressway, Lagos-Ibadan express road, Sagamu Interchange to Papalanto to Ilaro and the Owode-Yewa road” Others are “Ibadan-Oyo-Ilorin highway, Ibadan-Ife-Ilesha-Akure road, Ado Ekiti-Akure road and Lagos-Ikorodu-Itanke via Ibefun Ijebu Ode road.”
The OCF stressed that “repairing these roads is not only to the benefit of Yoruba land as it is a known fact that other Nigerians use these highways to access their own regions of the country from the South West, especially as they come to and fro to tap into the economic benefits of the South West.”
“Allocating at least 20% VAT collected from each region to it before taking the rest to the federal purse to share would afford each region the funding opportunity to meet their infrastructural challenges. For instance, Lagos, which currently grapples with a humongous infrastructural problem even as it is accountable for over 50% VAT revenue accruable to the federal purse nationwide, can have the proposed 20% VAT from the state to fix its public infrastructure, especially the roads, to make life better for over 25 million Yoruba and other ethnic nationalities who live and work in Lagos,” the OCF stated.
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