Amid the ongoing legal battle between the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) and the government of Rivers State over the collection of Value Added Taxes (VAT), the Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, has said that there was no “fighting” between both parties.
He said this by proxy, represented by the Attorney-General of the State, Zacchaeus Adangor, at a public lecture themed, ‘Taxing Powers in a Federal System’.
The governor noted that before the Nigerian constitution, each tier of government is “co-equal” because no one was birthed by the other.
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He said, “I have heard a lot of comments being made that we are fighting the Federal Government, there is no desire or any intention of the Rivers government to fight the Federal Government.
“The principle of co-equality is fundamental to a federal arrangement, that principle leads to the principle of autonomy, autonomy leads to physical autonomy and physical autonomy leads to physical federalism and when you put all the principles together, what it means is that each level of government, whether federal or state is co-equal because none derives its life from the other.
“They both derive their life from the constitution because they have co-equality.
“That is the fundamental aspect of physical federalism and until we get it, we will continue this journey of talking without result but I think that the court has a role to play, the court can lay this crises and controversy to rest when it makes a pronouncement.”
