Grievance Redress Mechanism: Network, KADIRS review Roles of Committee
By Uangbaoje Alex, Kaduna
Following the inauguration of the Grievance Redress Mechanism (GRM) Committee by the Kaduna State Internal Revenue Service (KADIRS) recently, Tax Justice and Governance Platform (TJ&GP), has met with the service to review roles of the committee.
The GRM is an institutional tool that fosters public confidence and enhances service delivery by enabling effective tracking of taxpayer grievances and ensuring corrective measures are taken where necessary.
The meeting reflected on the committee’s role in monitoring, reporting, and redressing taxpayer grievances in a way that is inclusive, accountable, and responsive to marginalized groups, including women, youth, and persons with disabilities.
During the meeting the network engaged the newly inaugurated 8 man GRM committee and deliberated on tracking and recording of all complaints and grievances received from taxpayers.
Assessed the efficient and effective use of the GRM Scorecard and establish a baseline for its internal control.
They identified it’s weaknesses and prioritize relevant actions needed to address the weaknesses and how to leverage the opportunities for improving the mechanism.
They also ensured accurate data disaggregation by gender (sex, age, and disability), improve analysis, and align with the project goal of improving gender responsiveness, accountability, transparency, and public engagement in tax processes.
In his address, Kaduna State Coordinator of TJ&GP, Simeon Olatunde, while congratulating the Committee, noted that setting up the committee was a response by the Chairman to their many advocacies.
Olatunde said, “It’s one of the best practices across the globe that if you want to identify a functional administration or system, there must be room to hear the concerns of the people.
“I’m happy that the chairman was able to oblige to our request, we have come a long way. I believe for over five years now that we’ve been discussing, reviewing, treating ourselves and rubbing minds, and now we’ve been able to address the committee issue.
“I’m here today with my team to also look at the Score card or the tool that we’re using to monitor our progress and to make sure that we document some of the concerns that taxpayers will bring.
“This is a step towards a bigger picture that we are looking at. We want to get to a point whereby besides this tool, we want to have a website that customer can be anywhere in the world and call you and say, I’m not in Nigeria and i want to go to complain about a service.”
While appreciating the network for their concerns, Coordinator, Local Government Revenue of the Service, Richard Bature, a member of the committee, noted that the meeting was timely and very important to the organization.
According to him, the review has exposed members of the committee to what grievance management and their engagements with taxpayers in the field really is.
“Every day, the taxpayers have one complaint or the other either in terms of assessment that we serve on them, or they are being harassed, or they are having issues with people in the system.
“So from here, we are going to do better in terms of attending to issues raised by the taxpayers to improve our revenue drive in the State”, Bature said.
