My friend Henri likes to come over to my office and have a chat. Today, the topic was about the impending NLC strike. Henri wondered why a "rich" country like Nigeria couldn't afford to meet Labour demand for N30k. I explained to him that 17 States owe salary at current Min Wage.
He had this look on his face like saying "cmon, don't give me that crap". According to Henri, there is no reason why a city like Lagos should not look like a "Dubai". He believes there is enough for everybody's need and not for everybody's greed. (That corruption issue again).
He then told me a story of when he landed a big job & got a "big" transfer into his account. He said he got a call from his relationship officer to come over to the bank because 'there is a problem'. When he got there, the banker wanted to know the source of d inflow into his a/c
He explained that it was his salary. The banker demanded to see his pay slip and time stamp. After providing it, he apologized for the bother but explained why he had to. He told him that he was required to report that transaction to the authorities who will match it with his tax
You see, the bank mgr was just merely giving him a heads up because he was going to report the transaction anyway. Henri wondered why this wasn't the case in Nigeria cos it'll be easy to curb corruption. I told him that our anti-money laundering law addressed the "reporting" part
But concerning the linkage to "tax"? I'm not sure. One thing is clear though, if we must reduce corruption we must be able to improve our identity mgt system. Everyone must have a unique ID. That unique ID must be the gateway into everything. Bank a/cs, Insurance, Tax, PVC, etc
Corruption only occurs when two things come together. 1. A system that enables it and 2. A willing person. Even if there is a willing "corrupt person" if the system makes it difficult to succeed, corruption will not happen. So we must ensure that we prioritize systemic change.
