SAN FRANCISCO, November 12, (THEWILL) – Nasarawa State governor, Abdullahi Sule has signed into law, a bill to regulate operations of hotels and other related businesses in the state.
The state Commissioner for Information, Culture and Tourism, Dogo Shammah made this known on Thursday, during an inspection tour of hotels and other related businesses in Lafia.
Shammah said, the signing of the bill is to pave way for registration, centralisation and collection of hotel taxes into a single account and to address multiple and illegal taxes in the industry.
“We cannot operate outside the provisions of the law; there is an instrument of power to back our operations as Gov. Abdullahi Sule has signed into law a bill passed by the state assembly for registration and regulation of hospitality industry in the state”, Shammah explained.
He said that the tour of hotels was part of governments’ effort to embark on e-registration, grading and standardisation of all existing hotels, night clubs, fast foods, cinemas and recreational centres in the state for easy identification of their business premises.
He further said that the state had identified tourism industry as a front runner in the transformation of the state economy, hence the desire to collaborate with the private sector to achieve accelerated economic growth through well-articulated programmes and policies.
“The planned repositioning of hotels and other related business enterprises in the state is not aimed at exploiting your efforts with tax, but rather, it is aimed at standardising your business to attract investors and clients to your facilities.
“It is the desire of the present administration, under the leadership of governor Sule to ensure that the state attains an accelerated economic growth and sustainable development through well-articulated programmes and policies in collaboration with the private sector,” he said.
