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Jinja monthly property tax revenue shoots to Shs8b
A sction of Jinja City. PHOTO/ DENIS EDEMA
What you need to know:
- According to Ms Kayongo, one of the areas of focus was road infrastructure within the City, some of which had become inaccessible to market places; and health centres, among others.
Property tax revenue in Jinja has increased from Shs2 billion to Shs8 billion monthly after authorities in Jinja City took a key decision to revalue untaxed property within the City.
The city deputy town clerk, Mr Peter Mawerere, said the increase in the local revenue was realised after the revaluation of property taxes that have never been taxed for several years, especially in the Northern Division.
“Jinja City’s local revenue has increased from Shs2 billion to Shs8 billion following the revaluation of taxable property and also introducing digitalisation of revenue collection from the business community,” Mr Mawerere said in an interview at the weekend.
He added: “This time around, we are using digital means to collect money from the people, not cash which had a lot of leakages and revenue collection gaps through which a lot of money was lost in the process.”
Mr Mawerere further explained that the revenue enhancement was achieved partly through Jinja City’s partnership with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in some projects, including; introducing domestic revenue mobilization for development to address the challenge of overdependence on government and development partners.
The Jinja City Planner, Ms Christine Kayongo, said her department initially faced challenges on how to come up with a concept to implement digitalisation of revenue tax collection until they had hired a consultant.
“The first thing we were told to adopt was capacity building of technical officers, politicians, private sector, civil society organizations and business community within the City. We had segmented meetings with different stakeholders and shared areas of focus, telling them the importance of paying property taxes. We also told them that the money will be used for making roads, improving health infrastructure and education,” she said.
According to Ms Kayongo, one of the areas of focus was road infrastructure within the City, some of which had become inaccessible to market places; and health centres, among others.
Jinja City Speaker, Mr Bernard Mbayo, said through using digital systems for collecting tax revenue, he has no doubt that local revenue collection will increase to Shs20b because there is no longer any opportunity for the officials to touch cash.
“Now that we have stopped receiving cash from our business community and use digitalisation to collect parking, licensing, and market fees, I have no doubt we shall grow our local revenue to Shs20b.
“Subsequently, Jinja City will have full road equipment to add to what was recently purchased at a cost of Shs2b; which, however, can’t do much. Over-dependence on government and development partners is not sustainable,” Mr Mbayo said.
He, however, noted that it is important to show the public what use their money has been put after it has been collected.
