As part of this initiative, the state government has moved against some celebrities in the state, who are alleged to be tax evaders despite their earnings from their business.

A court paper, sighted by Sunday Punch on Saturday, indicated that the state government had dragged sensational singer, David Adedeji Adeleke, popularly known as Davido, before the court for alleged tax evasion.

Also, a reliable source in the government told Sunday Punch that the state had equally moved against the popular comedian, Ayo Makun, better known as AY, for allegedly failing to pay tax.

Davido, the Chief Executive Officer of HKN Music, Lagos, has been charged before a Lagos High Court in July 2017 and risk a jail term if convicted.

AY has had a long history in court against the state as he was charged to court in 2016 for failing to file his tax returns as required by law.

“Notable among these alleged tax offenders are two of Nigeria’s celebrated artistes –Davido and AY, the comedian. Both artistes have had a long-standing battle with the Lagos Internal Revenue Service for tax evasion.

“Davido, who has record deals with Sony Music Entertainment and endorsement agreements with various companies in Nigeria, has not filed his tax returns or remit any taxes to the Lagos State Government,” the source said.

A reliable government source told Sunday Punch on Saturday that Davido had defended his action, claiming that he paid taxes to Osun State since he is an indigen of the state.

The source added, “Remember that Davido said he made N500m from his N30bn concert recently. We must know how much he paid to the LIRS.

“AY too said the same thing. The comedian claimed to be paying his taxes to Ondo State, where he hails from. It seems these celebrities don’t understand that the tax law stipulates that you must pay your tax to your state of residence.

“Anyway, we are already in court. Others will soon appear in court if they don’t obey the state tax law. You can’t be making money in Lagos and refuse to pay tax.”

Speaking with Sunday Punch on Saturday, AY said he was not aware of the suit, asking to be given some time to confirm if his office was in receipt of the court papers on the said suit.

The Manager of Davido, Asa Asika, who asked to be sent a text message concerning the singer’s suit with the state government on alleged tax evasion, had yet to respond to the text as of the time of filing this report.

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Source: punchng.com

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In a statement released by the lawyer of the ‘Fall’ hit maker,  Norrison Quakers (SAN) detailing their side of the story of the alleged murder, he added the artiste is worried by the death of his friend and in keeping with that will not hold some of his upcoming shows.

“Our client in honour of the memory of his departed friend has suspended his next few shows and musical engagements. We commiserate with the families of the deceased and pray that God will comfort them at a time like this,” he wrote.

Davido who is starting his ‘30 Billio Africa Tour’ on 7th October, 2017, was invited by the Lagos Police on October 11, 2017 to help investigations into the death of Tagbo whose body was deposited at the Lagos Island General Hospital after he had gone out to party n the company of Davido and few other friends on October 2.

According to the Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Imohimi Edgal, Davido’s invitation was premised on a revelation by the CCTV footage which shows that he and his friends dumped Tagbo in the car and took to their heels.

“It is our intention to know why the victim was taken to General Hospital Lagos, dumped and those who took him there fled the location without as much as notifying the hospital authorities or reporting to the police,” the Police Commander said.

“Autopsy has been conducted and the preliminary autopsy report reveals that the victim died of asphyxia which in layman’s term means suffocation,” he added.

Meanwhile, Davido’s lawyer has, through the statement, refuted the claims his client had murdered Tagbo. According to him, the evidence and footage available to the Police disclose the chain of events leading to the discovery of the remains of Mr. Tagbo Umeike do not in any way incriminate his Client, but rather absolves him of any criminal culpability.

“The facts that can be distilled from the CCTV footage obtained from “Shisha Room” are that on or about 12:23 am in the early hours of Tuesday the 3rd of October, 2017 our Client got ready to leave the premises of the “Shisha Room”, where he had gone to earlier in the company of some of his friends to celebrate the birthday of one Clarks Adeleke,” he said.

“Again, we reiterate our client arrived at the Shisha Room in his vehicle with his friends and the deceased arrived about one hour later in his own vehicle. The CCTV footage obtained from the ‘Shisha Room’ captured our Client and some others, including the deceased all standing close to our Client’s vehicle as he prepared to leave after the drinks and celebrations,” Mr. Quakers added.

Davido is supposed to start his ’30 Billion Africa Tour’ on 7^th October, 2017 at Macufe Festival, Bloemfotein, South Africa.

In subsequent days, he will be going to Zimbabwe, Ghana, Mozambique Botswana, Guinea, among other African countries.

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By: Kwame Dadzie/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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According naijaloaded.com.ng, the Federal Government of Nigeria through the National Broadcasting Corporation has banned Davido’s two hit songs, Olamide’s ‘Wo’ and ‘Wavy Level,’ and ‘Living Things’ by 9ice.

This comes a few days after Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Health openly aired it displeasure about visuals to ‘Wo.’

In its own opinion, the video portrays a bad message that encourages second-hand smoking.

Taking to its Twitter account, the ministry revealed that ‘Wo’ which featured a line where Olamide mentions cigarettes, contravenes Nigeria’s laws on Tobacco advertising, promotion & sponsorship. The risks from this include cancers, respiratory & cardiovascular diseases.

“The public is informed of the dangerous public health content & violation of Tobacco Ctrl Act 2015 in “Wo” by @olamide YBNL #ClearTheAir,” they tweeted.

They followed up with these tweets:

The general public who were not pleased with the ministry’s decision also expressed their dissatisfaction through these tweets:

It would be recalled that Falz had earlier called out music acts who entertain lavish lifestyles and also fraud. In view of Falz comment, 9ice’s ‘Living Things,’ was the major talking point.

It is not clear what about Davido’s songs may have called for their ban by the National Broadcasting Corporation but this gesture shows the NBC’s resolve to sanitise the lyrical content and visuals of Nigerian music.

Watch Davido’s ‘Fall’ in the link below:

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By: Kwame Dadzie/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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As it turns out, this is no advertisement gimmick. For almost four years, Ghana has had the status of a country in transition to eradicating the Guinea worm disease. With the last Guinea worm case being reported in May 2010 in Diare, a village in Northern Ghana, the country’s Guinea Worm Eradication Programme (GWEP) is on course to achieving total eradication status in July 2014. This will be when the country is assessed by a visiting international certification team. The programme, established in 1989,   is thus leaving no stone unturned to demonstrate how actively apparently nonexistent cases are being searched for. The Guinea worm cash reward is one strategy to achieve this.

“To qualify for the money, all you need to do is to report seeing a  hanging worm. At that point, it does not matter whether the worm is actually a Guinea worm or not.  Once this is done, the community health nurse will document it in the rumor register, inform the district disease control officer, who comes to take a sample and reports to regional officials, who then submit it to the national office in Accra together with the appropriately filled case registration form. We then forward the sample to the Centre for Disease Control in Atlanta, USA for diagnoses. So far, we have sent about ten samples out of which only two tested positive,” explained Dr. Asiedu-Bekoe, Guinea Worm Programme Manager. Also, since January 2013, nine persons have been lucky recipients of this reward money, which was increased from GH¢100 to GH¢200 in 2010 by then Vice President Mahama.

International certification for eradication is however no walk in the park. To achieve this  by July 2014 when the assessment visit by the international team is due,  Ghana must not  only  demonstrate steps it has taken to create awareness but it should actually achieve public awareness of the Guinea worm cash reward among at least 85% of health workers and 70% of the population. So far, organizations like the World Health Organization (WHO) and JICA are supporting with televised announcements and 100 000 posters on the cash reward respectively.  This is in addition to plans to enlist the support of community information centres, local gong gong beating systems and a national Guinea worm week in May 2014.

Increased public awareness on the cash reward aside, the international certification team will be assessing Ghana using other criteria. Chief among these would be how sensitive our current surveillance system for the disease is and also availability of safe potable water in formerly endemic areas. The target here is to get at least one safe water source (bore hole, tap water etc. ) per village in each of the 49 or so villages in which it was endemic as at 2009, a reduction from the 1200 endemic villages recorded in 2006.

Guinea worm contributes to school absenteeism, reduction in enrolment and reduction in farm work thus leading to decreased productivity. These have been prominent observations in the few remaining Guinea worm endemic countries like Ethiopia, Chad, South Sudan and Mali.

Asked for what additional support is required to ensure Ghana gets certified, Dr. Asiedu-Bekoe called for more airtime to educate the public, more funding to use community information centres and for central government to actively reach out to Municipal and District Chief Executives to facilitate the roll out of public awareness initiatives in their respective communities.

“We want this to be seen as a national effort. Guinea worm has associations with poverty and we do not think we belong to that class. If you look at the Guinea worm league, Ghana still remains part and we do not need to be there, especially as a low middle income country. The presence of Guinea worm in a low middle income country is an unfortunate paradox which we must not entertain. Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Niger have all done it in 2013. We think this is the time for Ghana to get certified for eradicating the disease.”

Sodzi Sodzi-Tettey

www.sodzisodzi.com

[email protected]

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