Enugu’s Tax Harvest of Tears: Peter Mbah's Monument of Exclusions And The Cry of Traders, Motorists and Transporters

The tragicomedy of governance currently unfolding in Enugu State has reached a fever pitch, degenerating into an unvarnished economic siege against the very citizens the government swore to protect. The civil unrest that recently rocked the Enugu State especially, the Main Market axis was not an isolated event; it was the inevitable eruption of an overburdened, frustrated, and economically strangled populace reaching its absolute breaking point under an administration determined to squeeze every last naira out of its people through relentless taxation.

Yet, true to form, the Enugu State Government has responded with insultingly disingenuous spin. Through press statements dismissing the uprising as drivers merely "seeking designated parking spaces" and blaming "desperate opposition infiltrators," the administration attempts to cover up the cries of daily earners. To claim that hundreds of motorists, commercial bus drivers, and tricycle operators shut down major transport hubs simply to ask where to park is laughable, and at best, a futile attempt to rewrite reality. As usual, Governor Mbah hides behind his finger!

Indeed, Enugu State’s reported Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) rose dramatically from ₦180.5 billion in 2024 to ₦406.77 billion in 2025, according to figures presented by the Executive Chairman of the Enugu State Internal Revenue Service, Emmanuel Ekene Nnamani. The administration routinely boasts that this surge reflects improved revenue mobilisation, central e-ticketing, and technological reforms.

However, behind every inflated revenue statistic are real human beings paying the ultimate price. They are the traders whose shops were bulldozed without compensation, or alternative spaces, under the pretext of urban renewal; the artisans struggling to stay afloat amid hyperinflation and soaring fuel prices; and the commercial drivers whose daily operational levies jumped from ₦350 to over ₦1,000 in just 20 months, on top of mandatory park fees, heavy fines, and exorbitant ticket charges.

And now, there is the newly increased ₦100 daily access fee charged to tricycle operators simply for accessing the park. This is in addition to the ₦750 daily levy these same tricycle operators (Keke riders) are required to pay for plying roads that, in many places, remain neglected. For operators already battling rising fuel prices, maintenance costs, and declining purchasing power, every additional charge represents another deduction from an already fragile livelihood.

They are the small-business owners crushed by compulsory heavy taxation levies and the young workers striving to survive another difficult day in Coal City.

The outcry raised at Holy Ghost, Old Park, and across the state deserves honest accountability, not arrogant dismissals, state propaganda, or insulting political semantics.

To understand the callousness of the current administration, one only needs to look at its punitive fiscal architecture and trail of unfulfilled promises.

Already suffocated by rising fuel costs and multiple daily charges, commercial operators are penalized for accessing transport hubs built on the ruins of their former livelihoods. Rather than offering relief, government policies actively drive transporters back onto neglected roads riddled with potholes.

These same citizens remain victims of the grand promise, "Water in 180 days" pledge, a promise made nearly four years ago that has delivered empty taps and broken faith. Furthermore, after the insensitive demolition of livelihoods to construct modern transit terminals, ill-concieved urban renewal, the newly erected lock-up shops were priced out of reach at ₦15 million to ₦20 million. Consequently, these facilities sat largely deserted, standing as high-priced monuments of exclusion, until public outrage forced the government into aggressive enforcement actions to mask its policy failures.

Meanwhile, phantom achievements such as the touted 260 Type-2 health centers and smart schools remain far more vibrant in government press releases than in the everyday reality of ordinary citizens.

One must ask: what is the color of this administration's heart? Generating state revenue should empower the people, not serve as an extractive weapon against the working class. When a government measures its success solely by the size of its treasury while its citizens suffer under unsustainable taxation, that governance is a catastrophic failure.

Reacting to the civil disturbances as witnessed in some parts of Enugu metropolis, the Nigeria Democratic Party, NDC, governorship candidate, Sir Chinyeaka Ohaa, said, "Ndi Enugu cannot continue to endure this predatory trajectory under Governor Peter Mbah. The time has come for the electorate to take a decisive stand and vote them out come 2027." 

Ohaa continued, "We shall deploy a strategic policy framework focused on immediate relief, structural  reform, and alternative revenue generation framework to replace Governor Mba's inhuman internally generated revenue scheme. Mbah's primitive punitive inforcemenent shall be replaced with growth-oriented fiscal policies. We shall stabilize household economics while maintaining state infrastructure funding through transparent PPP, Fair Tax Policy, and accruable revenue from Federation Account, FAAC. We shall abolish Mba's informal and multi-tiered levies to eliminate  duplicate charges on small businesses, shop owners and transport operators, and most importantly, on May 29, 2027, we shall announce, and effect, *immediate moratorium* for micro-enterprises, tax exemptions for vulnerable informal operators such as keke drivers, other transport operators, street vendors and small artisans. 

"On Land and Property sector, we shall reform and recalibrate Mbah's prohibitive Land Use and Property Charges by revising, downward, the present high land-related fees, commercial property taxes, and developmental levies to rebuild confidence in, and boost, real estate business in Enugu, thereby lowering housing costs for Ndi Enugu. We shall introduce phased C-of-O billing system, replace the present high upfront capital requirements for Certificates of Occupancy (C-of-O) with deferred or installmental-based models to encoursge property registration. In a short while, we shall unveil the details of what we have for Ndi Enugu going forward from May 29, 2027." 

— Odalije Media Team