The Kwara State Internal Revenue Service (KWIRS) has restated its commitment to promote tax education and quality learning among secondary school students in the state.

This is as the Service said it would continue to nurture tax-compliant generations through deliberate exposure to rudiments of taxation right from the secondary school till taxable adulthood.

The Executive Chairman of the Service, Mrs. Shade Omoniyi, disclosed this during the grand finale of the 2022 Tax Club Quiz competition, organised by the Kwara State Internal Revenue Service (KWIRS) in Ilorin. No fewer than 219 public and private secondary schools across the 16 Local Government Areas of Kwara state have participated in the quiz competition.

For emerging the overall winner of the competition, Eucharistic Heart of Jesus Christ Secondary School, Ilorin won the star prize of N2.5 million; Mustapha Standard School, Offa which came second received N1.5 million, while the College of Education Model Secondary School, Oro came third and went home with N1 million.

Omoniyi, who noted that the competition was designed to nurture tax-compliant generations, added that the competition is part of the Community Impact Programmes (CIP) of the Service. While describing the 2022 edition as a huge improvement over that of last year with a total of 142 contestants/students, she pointed out that the six participating schools in the final rounds also received consolation prizes.

Also speaking, the state’s Deputy Governor, Mr. Kayode Alabi, expressed the need to proactively invest in tax practice and administration in order to build a virile environment to make the business of taxation thrive at all levels. The Deputy Governor, who urged people to always play their part in building a virile environment by paying their tax regularly, said the issue of taxation is what everyone should be thinking “because we can only be in the category of a tax administrator, tax practitioner or tax payer.”

In her remarks the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Education and Human Capital Development, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, said the main objective of the competition was to prepare the younger generations ahead of future challenges of tax collections.

The Permanent Secretary, however, described the theme of the competition: “Raising a Generation of Tax Compliance Citizens,” as suitable, saying the competition would go a long way in creating awareness that “raising future younger tax compliance citizens, starts now.”

She commended the KWIRS for supporting the educative and intellectual project of the state government that commenced in April, 2016, adding that “the School Club Quiz competition project is a good thinking in a right direction.”

“I, therefore, assure you that the ministry will continue to support the realisation of the set objectives of this brilliant project,” she added.