22nd May, 2019
Mr Moses Garuba, Commandant General, Federal Task Force (FTF) has reiterated the commitment of the unit to boost revenue for the Federal Government.
Garuba stated this during a Public Hearing on Revenue Defaulters, Piracy and National Heritage Protection Bill, 2017 before a joint sitting of the senate committees on Finance, Culture and Tourism.
The bill, which scaled first and second readings on March 22, 2017 and Dec. 20, 2017 was sponsored Sen. Sam Anyanwu (PDP-Imo).
The bill seeks to generate funds from revenue defaulters, piracy as well protect national heritage among others.
“We are happy that the bill has scaled first and second reading and today we had a public hearing,” he said.
Garuba dismissed fears that the task force would only end up replicating functions of other government agencies, saying, “our mandate is clear, and never a duplication of function”
He said that besides revenue generation, the force would create employment for the teeming youth across the country.
“Our mandate covers recovering federal monuments that are wasting across thecountry, the fear that this will be a burden on the government is seriously misplaced.
“For instance, one of our mandates is to task motorists whose cars emit carbon monoxide beyond acceptable level, we get offenders to pay fines in areas that other agencies cannot,” he said.
Speaking during the hearing, Senate Co-Chairman of the joint committee, Sen. John Enoh, urged agencies that made presentations at the hearing to submit their papers to the committee secretariat.
He assured that the committee would analyse the presentations with a view to forwarding a report to the senate as soon as possible.