Delta State Governor, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa has challenged the Nigerian Immigration Service to provide accurate data of expatriates to check loss of revenue.
Okowa in a group photograph with Immigration officers at Government House, Asaba. |
Governor Okowa made the call today (28/03/17)
when the Comptroller, Immigration Services, Delta State Command, Mr. Baba Ali
Zakari led officials of the agency to pay him a courtesy visit in Asaba.
The Governor who expressed surprise
that the Immigration Service had accurate records of expatriates in Delta State
observed that such should be made available to the state Board of Internal
Revenue Service to ensure that revenue accruing to the state and the country is
not lost.
“I am glad that we are monitoring and
supervising the expatriates quota in the state because, sometimes, we hear
about them (expatriates) coming in; they work and live here and because proper
records are not kept on them, the state and nation loses in terms of revenue
that is derivable from taxes that are supposed to be paid by them; so, I am
glad that you (Immigration Service) have given us the number of expatriates in
the state at the moment and the Board of Internal Revenue will look into its
records to ensure that it correlates with your records and if it does, we can
take it up immediately because, we know that there are sharp practices by some
of our companies that are involved in the oil sector,” Governor Okowa said.
Governor Okowa also used the occasion
to state that with active immigration service, crime rates would be reduced,
especially in Delta State where the Police have noticed that most of the crime
committed in the state were by foreigners.
According to him, “we are very much
aware that there is a lot of work for you (Immigration) to do and that there is
greater need to continue to monitor immigrants who are within the various
localities in the state; so, I am glad to hear that you have officers
distributed through the local government areas because, we know that crime rate
is increasing now and it is time for us to become more cautious about allowing
people come into our states.”
“We know that the law in Nigeria
allows us to move freely but, it is important that the people who come into our
state are properly documented because, only recently, some criminals that were
caught, some of them are foreigners as the Commissioner of Police did report to
me,” he said, stating, “we have to be proactive in continuously
monitoring the people that come in, sometimes some of these people do not stay
in hotels, they stay in all sort of slums and places we do not expect
them to be, and that is a challenge especially when we have to deal with the
issues of kidnapping; it is important that we continue to work along with our
sister institutions to monitor this.”
The Governor also, charged
Immigration to step up its activities on checking human trafficking in the
country, noting, “we have begun to see a lot of human trafficking and children
being sold; though many of the children are sold within the country; they may
also be moved out of the country, so, there is need for collaboration between
the various security agencies in the monitoring of what goes on and I thought
this had to be brought to the fore.”
Earlier, Mr Zakari said the visit was
to brief the Governor and members of the state executive council of the
activities of the Immigration Service in the state.
He thanked Governor Okowa’s
administration for its numerous assistance to the agency especially, the
construction of access roads to the Immigration Office in the state and also,
the Governor’s commitment to ensuring security of lives and property in the
state, disclosing that the Immigration Service was not relenting in
repatriating illegal immigrants in the state.
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