The coordinator of Moniepoint for Anambra, Mr Ndubuisi Anadi, has been detained by the Anambra State Internal Revenue Service (AIRS) on suspicion of diverting taxes paid by the general public and dismantling the state’s payment system, DailyTrust reports.
After the arrest, Dr Christian Madubuko, the Executive Director of AIRS in charge of Operations and Other Revenues, revealed this in Awka.
Additionally, he suggested that the state might outlaw the Moniepoint service.
To help with state tax collection, the state government hired Moniepoint’s services.
The arrest resulted from reports that taxes sent into government accounts by Anambra residents using the platform did not reach the central system of the state government.
According to Madubuko, 1,200 taxes paid through Moniepoint were improperly used, and the bank abruptly stopped accepting government payments.
“We have been receiving complaints of people paying their taxes but they were not reflecting.
“So, we commenced investigations and found that many payments made from one Moniepoint PoS since April this year have not been reflected in the state central system.
“The investigation is just from one PoS, and we have many others across the state, and you can imagine what is going on. It shows that these monies which we have their receipts, were diverted.
“We have requested the agreement between the AIRS and Moniepoint but we have not received that. What they gave us instead is the list of Moniepoint locations across the state. That is why we arrested the coordinator of Moniepoint in the state,” he said.
Dr. Madubuko further said that Anadi would be charged to court and if found guilty would face the full wrath of the law.
For his part, Anadi said the company received several notifications that taxpayer payments were not reflected in the government’s account.
He explained that it was a glitch in the system whereby the transaction would hit the Moniepoint platform but would not reflect in the Central Processing System.
“We were notified about the glitch and as of today, our tech guys are working on the issue to address the problem and find out what happened.
“We had resolved the glitch. The money is in a government account and we are working to prove that,” he said.
When questioned about removing the government payment system, Nnadi admitted that they removed it without due notification to the government, lamenting that it was removed due to the huge loss recorded by their business owners.
