A’Ibom revenue agency seals GTBank premises over tax default

The Akwa Ibom State Internal Revenue Service (AKIRS), on Monday sealed the two Uyo branches of Guarantee Trust Bank (GTBank) over unpaid taxes running into N184 million.

Mr Leo Umanah, Executive Director Enforcement and Recovery, AKIRS who lead the team on the operation, told journalists in Uyo that the two branches were on Udo Udoma Street and Abak Road.

He noted that the government agency had acquired an ex parte order from the state High Court, Uyo Division, restricting access to the premises of the bank and its facilities.

According to him, the order was issued by Hon. Justice Imeh Umanah.

He explained that the two branches were given warning notice on Feb. 4 that they had not been remitting the actual tax deducted from their employees’ salaries and other relevant taxes due the state.

He said further that GTBank was informed that by so doing, it had failed to comply with the provisions of relevant tax laws.

According to the AKIRS official, the bank had failed to comply with the warning after 10 months.

The director said that the bank had taken AKIRS to court in Uyo, Port Harcourt and Benin City over the tax remittance but the cases were struck out in favour of the revenue agency.

Umanah said that the the agency had exhausted reconciliation and negotiation opportunities with the bank.

He said AKIRS was left with no choice but get ex parte order to recover the government revenue.

He added that the bank was served the notice of distrain and under the law, they had 14 days to negotiate with AKIRS and vacate the order.

“If after 14 days, they do not comply, we have the mandate of the court to sell the property and recover the tax owed the state,” he said.

Umanah observed that many business outfits in the state were withholding government taxes running into billions of naira.

He insisted that in the ongoing enforcement drive, AKIRS was poised to recover the state government’s revenue to enable it to realise its “completion agenda.”