A former Director-General of National Orientation Agency (NOA), Alhaji Idi Farouk, has advised the Federal Government to effectively engage citizens on its proposed tax reforms and other policies.
Farouk told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Wednesday in Abuja that if government wanted its policies and programme to resonate well with the citizens, it should carry them along through effective orientation and enlightenment.
According to him, if government fails to carry people along in its policies and programmes, the may consider them to be negative, irrespective of their positive impacts or the good intention behind their implementation.
He identified effective enlightenment and orientation as one of the weapons being used by American Government for implementation of it policies.
“Government must appreciate that for every policy that will affect the lives of people, they have to carry them along. Otherwise, you will see what is trending every day, if you open it, you will see negative reactions, because they don’t even know the positive sides of it. It’s government’s business to do so.
‘’That is why we say that it is necessary for government to listen to people on these tax reforms.
“I’m sure that if this (sensitisation) had come before the presentation, my decision can be your decision if I discuss with you.
“So, we must apply that in all that we do. But we can’t take it and push it down the throats of the people.
“There must be so many good things in the tax reforms but if people see it negatively, it is negative and it will not get good response,’’ Farouk said.
He, however, advised citizens to know that some government could be painful at the inception, but their impacts might turn out to be great.
On the financial autonomy granted to local governments in Nigeria by the Supreme Court, Farouk appreciated the Federal Government and President Bola Tinubu for leading the initiative.
He advised state governors to allow the third tier of government to operate independently and effectively.n
Instead of stiffing the local governments of fund, he said that state government should put in place some measures, including oversight, to make the third tier of government accountable.
Farouk recalled that when he was chairman of a local government in Kaduna State, the council’s allocations used to come directly to the council and it ran effectively as an autonomous government.
“I see states dabbling into a lot of affairs of the local governments. States are clearing refuse; they are building markets and occupying markets, states are doing all sorts of things that belong to the local governments, including signboard which is a local government revenue,” he said.
The former director-general said that state governors had no option than to obey the Supreme Court judgment granting financial autonomy to the local governments.
“The truth is that we still call them local governments. So how can they pocket them when the Federal Government did not put them (governors) under its own pocket?’’ he queried. (NAN)
