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Kashim Imam, Chairman of TETFund’s Board of Trustees presents the ‘Top Tax-payer Award’ to Muniru Haruna of Julius Berger Plc in Lagos recently

“The Award to Julius Berger is a well-deserved recognition for the company’s patriotism and loyalty to the ideals setting up TETFund.”

– Kashim Imam, Chairman of TETFund’s Board of Trustees

The Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFund, last week in Lagos honoured Nigeria’s leading engineering construction company, Julius Berger Nigeria Plc. with an ‘Award of Merit’ for being “The top Tax payer organisation in Nigeria’s Construction Sector”.

The event was the 3rd Edition of TETFund’s Tax Payers Forum held at the five-star Lagos Continental Hotel, Victoria Island and had in attendance the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu ably represented by his deputy, Dr. Kadiri Obafemi Hamzat.

In his welcome address, the Executive Secretary of TETFund, Prof. Suleiman Elias Bagoro, said inter alia, “…in trying to fulfil its constitutional roles, TETFund identified the critical mass of tax payers, especially the top ones. We then came here to appreciate these key tax payers, particularly the ones receiving Awards of Merit today….the 2% education tax is annually remitted by companies through the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, to TETFund for allocation and onward disbursement to beneficiary institutions of higher learning across the country,” Bagoro added.

Lagos state deputy Governor reinforced the Executive Secretary, Bagoro’s voice saying that the event was TETFund’s own way of “encouraging the trust of tax payers” even as he urged the organisation to do more to attract more taxpayers in fulfilment of the amended Act No. 16 of 2011 that established the Fund.

The Chairman of TETFund’s Board of Trustees who presented the award to Julius Berger, declared the award as “a well-deserved recognition for the company’s patriotism and loyalty to the ideals setting up TETFund.” He also encouragingly said that, “companies so recognised must not relent in continuing the great job they are doing with their compliant tax remittances.”

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Deputy Governor of Lagos State His Excellency Dr. Kadiri Obafemi Hamzat (middle); Chairman of TETFund’s Board of Trustees, Kashim Imam (2nd from right); Executive Secretary of TETFund, Prof. Suleiman E. Bagoro; Vice Chancellor of University of Lago, Prof. Oluwatoyin T. Ogundipe; Olorogun Sunny Kuku who represented the Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu and other important dignitaries from the National Assembly at the Award event in Lagos recently

Speaking after he received the Award on behalf of Julius Berger, the head of the company’s Tax Department, Muniru Haruna, remarked that, “…we feel honoured by TETFund’s recognition of Julius Berger as one of the most consistently compliant and, in fact, highest tax payer in the country’s construction sector. At Julius Berger, we seriously honour our tax obligations as a patriotic duty. We thank and appreciate TETFund for acknowledging our long standing commitment and compliance by this award”. Officials from the Media Relations Office of Julius Berger Plc also attended the event in Lagos.

Other dignitaries at the event included the Vice Chancellor of University of Lagos, Prof. Oluwatoyin T. Ogundipe who delivered the keynote address; co-founder of EKO Hospital, Olorogun Sunny Kuku who represented the Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu; and representatives of the Senate and House of Representatives respective Committees on Education and TETFund.