Amidst kicks by some Northern elites on the proposed Tax Reforms Bills, former Speaker, House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, has expressed his unalloyed support for the Bills.
Speaking at The 14th convocation ceremony Of The Achievers University, Owo, on Saturday December 14, Dogara who commended president Bola Tinubu’s reform in strengthening the Local Government Areas by granting them autonomy, described the president as a courageous leader.
“We have practised this model of leadership that is based on weakness. It has taken us nowhere. The president reforms in local government has reinforced more leadership to the third tier of government. What the president did with the local government was a master stroke.
“To give in to cheap argument because things are tough and he should back off is cowardice. We are having a leader who is courageous.”
The ex-Speaker maintained that by freeing local government areas from the choke-hold of economic stagnation the states had hitherto subjected them to, the president has given Nigerians a glimmer of hope on his preparedness to lead with unbridled courage even at personal cost.
“It gladdens my heart that we are now dealing with a leader who is not avoiding stubborn tasks and very much unwilling to put off difficult conversations. With him, courage has become a habit and that habit has the power to transform our leadership as the miracles we are desperately yearning for may well lie in the tasks and difficult conversations we are avoiding.
“I support president’s tax reforms not because they are perfect but because it is the right thing to do. However, I must concede the fact that those opposed to it have the right to do so but I do not share their jaundiced nay tenuous and puerile position that because they disagree with some aspects of the reforms, then the reforms must be withdrawn or killed,
“Leaders who are dedicated to reforms and progress don’t make such poor judgement calls, at all. A call to do nothing about the reforms was either bad politics or sheer buffoonery or a combination of both.” He explained further.
