Edo State Governor, Adams Oshiomhole, has said that low income earners in the state will not pay the Land Use Charge.
The governor, who spoke on Thursday, said palaces of traditional rulers and places of worship would be exempted from paying the Land Use Charge.
Civil society groups and some residents had on Monday protested against the property taxation law, a policy which they claimed would further impoverish the poor.
But Oshiomhole, who spoke in Benin during a town hall meeting to mark his seventh year in office, explained that the law, which was introduced in 2012, was aimed at boosting the Internally Generated Revenue of the state and using it to improve the lot of the masses.
He also said that he hoped to bequeath a strong financial base to his successor.
The governor said, “Let me assure you that over the next 12 months, we will continue to complete the projects that we have already started. We will start new ones that we need to start; we will re-engineer the finances of the state. We will enforce the collection of the Land Use Charge in the areas that are covered.
“And I would like to explain that we will never, even in the name of revenue drive, collect Land Use Charge from high density areas; Land Use Charge is restricted to low density areas.”
He continued, “If you occupy 10,000 square-metre residence, for God’s sake, you have to pay the Land Use Charge. We cannot accept a situation where one man would own 200 houses, and 100 of such houses are locked up; you are not paying taxes (but) a poor man with two wives and 40 children live in a bungalow at Upper Sakponba. Let me assure our people, we will not collect Land Use Charge from poor family houses.”
“We will not collect Land Use Charge from poor communities. We will not collect Land Use Charge from palaces, from churches, from places of worship. We will not collect from the poor but this government will collect Land Use Charge from the rich.”
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