One of the civic duties of a citizen of any country including Nigeria is to pay taxes. He is not expected to be praised or parted on the back when he does it. Though, he can be encouraged to do it, but it is not incumbent upon the government to continue to praise him to high heavens for being a responsible citizen.
However, as a citizen that has been faithful to his civic duty, he has a right to expect something else in return. He has a right to expect good roads, good drinking water, regular power supply, employment, good telecommunication facility, security, and many more. These are just a few of his rights, not his privileges as we have come to accept as the norm in Nigeria today.
We idolise our leaders and turn them to ‘gods’ when they build us low-standard roads. We praise them to high heavens as if it is their personal money that has been used to do it. We even buy them gifts, and rollout the red carpet when they come visiting our communities, all because they have tarred a 1-kilometre road for us; forgetting that it behoves them to do it in the first place.
Though, our tax laws are far from being perfect, with millions of people and hundreds of companies exploring some few loopholes to escape paying what they should; our government too are failing the citizens in the area of infrastructure. However, the Federal Inland Revenue Service FIRS should be parted on the back for generating billions of revenue for the government. More can still be done, but the best way to encourage the citizens to pay taxes is not just by educating the people on the need to, but by improving the social and economic wellbeing of the masses.
Government should reciprocate the good gesture of the citizens by improving on existing infrastructure, while developing new ones. Infrastructures should be spread across nooks and crannies of the nation, not limited to areas where a particular political party thinks it has garnered more votes.
Politicians should rise above parochial interest and stop focusing on areas where they have only received votes. After all, taxes are not paid on the bases of which political party one belongs to.
Why should Local Government ‘A’ be denied government’s attention because it doesn’t belong to the party at the centre?
For the purpose of clarity, there is nothing wrong in showering praises on a government that has performed well; but it is not mandatory.
