Osun Goes Digital In Revenue Collection

The Osun State Government has barred revenue collectors in the state from collecting cash for payments into the state coffers. The ban includes cash payments for school fess, fines and charges.

A statement issued in Osogbo, the state capital on Sunday by Governor Rauf Aregbesola’s media aide, Mr. Semiu Okanlawon, said the governor made the disclosure at a meeting with labour leaders in the state.

According to the statement, the state government had finalised plans to go digital in the collection of its revenues and do away with all avenues through which revenue officials handle cash.

The governor was quoted as saying, “I must announce this to all of you that as from next month (January), no revenue official will be allowed to come in contact with cash again. This is because we have decided to go digital in our revenue collection.

“So, be it school fees, fines, charges, and all other forms of payment in obligations to the government by the citizens, no cash will be collected again.

“I thank the entire workforce in the state for their sense of responsibility; for their exhibition of the Omoluabi ethos.

“I find it difficult to deprive any worker his or her income at the end of each month. So, for the workers to express their readiness to tolerate and absorb the delay in salary payment is the highest demonstration of understanding and patriotism. That sense of duty, patriotism and extreme sacrifice is appreciated”.

Aregbesola also lamented that the revenue crisis had created complications in the payment of salaries across the country, saying, “Either at the federal or at the state level, where is it that workers in this country are being paid as at when due?

“We thought this situation will not last long. That was why we used our strategic reserve to augment salaries for one year. All our savings were spent on augmentation of salaries. Our commitment to the welfare of workers is incomparable”.

Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress in the state, Comrade Saka Adesiyan, while explaining why the workers welcomed the delay in payment of their salary, said it was more realistic for workers having seen the true picture and bearing in mind the previous good disposition of the Aregbesola administration to workers’ welfare.