Artisans And Domestic Workers To Pay Taxes In Lagos

Today, Lagos State Government announced that it had increased its tax gap to include domestic workers and artisans. Mr. Olufolarin Ogunsanwo, the Chairman of the Lagos State Internal Revenue Service (LIRS) made the announcement at a news conference in Alausa. He said that the new tax regime was in line with Gov. Akinwunmi Ambode administration’s inclusion of every resident for the growth of the state. Mr. Ogunsanwo said the agency had commenced the process of overhauling the informal sector with a view to ensuring voluntary compliance by all tax payers. He said the agency had identified three categories of tax payers in the sector. According to him, they include market men/women, artisans, micro, small and medium-scale enterprises and domestic staff. He said these categories of people were expected to remit one per cent of what they earned to government’s coffers. Ogunsanwo said that a directorate had been created in the agency to oversee the sector, while modalities for taxing these categories of people had been worked out. According to him, the declining national revenue as a result of the fall in the global price of oil and the need for government to provide and maintain basic infrastructure necessitated the regime.

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