Anyone who lives in Enugu and pays house rents has a different story to tell from the pictures painted here. Landlords cry as much as the tenants do and the factual message they present is far from the “made in the air” beautiful pictures painted about taxations in Enugu.

I know many Landlords and tenants in Enugu today who have cried to me about the unbearable pains they go through on account of over taxation in Enugu. I would take the story of one as an example here.

This person has a very good Landlord who took a million and half naira(N1.5m) from him for a duplex and has maintained that for a while until recently when the same duplex was billed two and half million naira (N2.5m) as annual tax by the Enugu State Government.

For this reason, this very kind-hearted man (landlord) had to increase his kind rent of N1.5m to four million naira (N4m) just to make up for the N2.5m annual tax while retaining his own kind returns of N1.5m.

This story is not an isolated case in Enugu except for one who does not live here and who has no time to relate with people who live here, unless one outrightly chooses the path of dishonesty for whatever reason best known to the person.

#BadGovernance
I was once told that even barrow pushers who earn little or nothing on daily basis after taking minimal care of their daily feeding and payment for the barrows which some of them hire, are still made to pay heavy taxes everyday.

I thought it was a joke until I decided to go to the Ogbete main market to see things for myself. I went with one of my parishioners who is still alive. What I saw and heard from that market are better experienced than talked about. The average person in that market is in very terrible pains.

After my tour of the market, I picked very few items at very exorbitant prices and decided to take them out with a barrow and the young man (barrow pusher) charged us five hundred naira. The person who went with me wanted to object to it, but the calm young man explained that they pay hundred naira as tax for every trip they make out of the market no matter what one carries.

#enugustateisbleeding

I followed the barrow pusher strictly and discussed with him on our way out of the market. I couldn’t hold my emotions when he revealed to me that he is a graduate of Enugu State University of Science and Technology, but he started pushing barrow after spending five years on other menial jobs without getting anything to feed himself and his now very old parents. He had not married as at that time. *

At the rear-entrance to the market, we were stopped by the tax collectors who eventually collected hundred naira tax from the poor boy and issued a receipt to him.*

Of course, I had to give him much more than he charged us and asked him to go and eat, rest for a while, before continuing for that day. This is the real Enugu of today and not the Enugu of our excellent stories!

#highlightseveryonefollowers

Dear Chief and any other person who cares to adopt the Chief’s story probably from a distance, do you know how much a plate of food costs in Enugu at the moment? How many poor or even average persons can afford a plate of food or afford to pay the least house rents in Enugu today?

Dear Chief, I guess you know that it costs an average of three hundred and fifty thousand naira to put a child in the present TVET College you wrote about here? Are you aware that it takes almost two hundred thousand naira to keep a child there for a term, and we have three terms in a year? How many average or poor people can afford that in Enugu today?

I can go on and on and on ad infinitum but let me try to conclude with earlier questions which you appeared to have skilfully evaded. This might help some of the journalists in our midst to report things as they are and not just things as they are paid to do.

Did you watch my earlier videos on violence in some gatherings of some members of some opposition parties in Enugu State? Why do we see the pictures of the Governor and other APC aspirants everywhere in Enugu without images of other people in opposition?

Is it safe to say that Enugu is still free and safe with what appears to be the enforcement of a one party system in the State?

Why do you think the major media outlets in Enugu State only sing the songs of APC today with almost no voice for the opposition? Is Enugu really free and safe or is it that “everything is fair in politics”?

Dear Chief, how is Enugu money working for Ndi Enugu? Who are the Ndi Enugu? Do you mean the people of Enugu many of whom are poor and still, or now, more unable to access minimal meaningful living and care?

Do you mean the many whose sources of livelihood were demolished without any alternative plans or compensation for life?

Do you mean the many who have died on account of these imposed avoidable hardships or the many left (abandoned) to mourn their deceased ones without care or consolation?

My biological father retired as a headmaster in 2003 and died after many years of waiting in vain for his gratuities and many unpaid pensions.

I have equally spent so much money even in very recent times processing endless papers and doing endless verifications for that payment, just to honour my late father’s wish. All these efforts have remained exercises in futility even when most of them were compelled by this same government that “does not overtax the citizens”!

How actually is Enugu money working for Ndi Enugu? My questions remain same as yesterday:

*How does this Enugu record of fastest revenue growth affect the average or poor person in Enugu? Is it raising the quality of life of an average person in town or even in the villages or has it made things worse than they have ever been?

Do the average or poor person in Enugu make more income or less now? What is the present cost of living in Enugu like? Has anything meaningful to the life of the average person changed for good in Enugu on account of this revenue growth?

Are the dividends of the revenue growth meant only for the rich and highly placed politicians in Enugu or for all?

What are the signs that the average person in Enugu is truly blessed by this ‘growth’ ? Who are the Ndi Enugu that Enugu money (ego Ndi Enugu) is really working for?*

Our dear Governor might have some excellent plans on paper, but it is not actually the papers that truly represent Ndi Enugu unless you mean to let us know that now?

What happens about meaningful people like you spending more time telling the Government the truth about the real ordeals of the ordinary citizens than spending such time to tell those beaten not to cry and go out to announce that everything is fine because they are not crying out, after all, “all is fair in politics”?

I am a Catholic priest ordained in Enugu more than twenty four years ago. I live in Enugu State and work in Enugu State.

Members of my flock are the rich, the average and the very poor. Most of them belong to the last group. I relate with them personally as a shepherd, I touch them and smell them very well.

I had to write today because I was celebrating Holy Masses and attending to my very anguished poor people yesterday!

Salus animarum suprema lex!