Anambra seals banks, hotels, schools for tax evasion

The Anambra State Government on Thursday sealed-off no fewer than 35 buildings in the industrial town of Nnewi for the refusal of the owners to pay property rate of over N150 million.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the buildings include commercial banks, hotels, business plazas, filling stations, hospitals, residential homes as well as primary and secondary schools.
Chinenye Okafor, the Head of Human Resources and Administration of Anambra Property and Land Use Charge, explained that the closure followed various court judgments obtained against the tax evaders.
Okafor said the affected buildings owed the state government N150,455, 814.59.
She said the agency, in 2014 and 2015, carried out similar enforcement in Awka and Onitsha on 125 buildings, noting that more buildings would be sealed-off as soon as judgments were obtained.
She said: “We are advising property owners in the state, particularly in Onitsha, Awka, Ogidi and Nkpor, to go and pay their property rates or face the wrath of the law.
“We had discussion with some of them and they had promised to pay since November 2014, but up till now, we have not seen any positive response from them.
“We are no longer interested in continuing with appealing or sensitising them because we have tried it for more than two years now and nothing was coming out of it.
“The government has considered the second option of litigation and enforcement this time after dialogue had failed.”
NAN.