Project Materials

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Revenue is a very essential element of substance and accomplishment. It is a source from which government draws its strength for survival, a propelling ingredient of administration which cannot in any way be treated carelessly (Musa, 2016).

The Advance English Dictionary (9th edition) defines revenue as “income especially the total annual income of the state government department which collects money for public funds”

The Nigeria constitution (1999) on the other hand defines revenue as: any income or return accruing to or derived by the  government of the federation from any source and includes; any receipts, however described, arising  from the operation of any law;

any return, however described arising from or in respect of any property held by the government of the federation: any return by way of interest on loans and dividends in respect of shares or interest held by the government of the  federation in any company or statutory body.

Every organization desires to be productive. In essence high productivity is the major aim for the existence of any organization. But on the contrary the bid to attain higher productivity has remained a wishful thinking for many organizations in Nigeria including the Nigeria Local Government System.

This was the main reason why Simon (1957) argued that the issue of productivity is the only reason for all the various reforms exercises that is being carried out in most public organizations so as to make them efficient. Productivity in public organization entails the attainment of predetermined goals with minimal expenditure of resources.

By this therefore, it is not wrong for one to liking productivity with maximum efficiency. This is because, efficiency means using the cheapest means towards achieving the desired result or it could mean the efficiency with which goods and services are produced, that is the ratio of the output of goods and services to the input of resources (Ogunna 2007).

He further posits that this could be measured on the basis of output per man hour and that an unproductive organization would produce a wholesome disappointment to its owners and widespread dissatisfaction and disaffection to the entire employees, while a productive organization is seen as a blessing to the owners as this brings profit to the management.

However, productivity or unproductivity of the Nigeria civil service system can better be understood when we examine the internal dynamics of the system despite its numerous reforms.

Nnadozie (1986) maintained that the productive or the unproductive nature of any organization would be understood when such factors as the characteristics of the organization in question, the character of the Nigerian society where it functions and the nature of the interaction between the organization and the wider society is considered.

Mali (1978) posited that productivity is the measure of how well resources of an organization are brought together and utilized for accomplishing of a set of results. This means reaching the highest level of performance with the least expenditure of resources.

Productivity in the above context could mean the mixture of resources; physical and Human to achieve greater output. Based on the foregoing, productivity of the employees simply means the ability of the employees of any organization to discharge their functions very well at the shortest possible time using the available resources.

But today, looking at the Nigerian public sector such as the local government system in Nigeria, low productivity has taken its greater toll on them. The employees of the Nigerian local government system are believed to have poor work ethics with some reasons which ranges from economic, sociological managerial and Technological factors (Ikejiani Clark and Ezeh 2009).

This they argued has made the Nigerian local government unproductive as resources both human and material are wasted without achieving the desired result. According to Ogunna (2007) productivity in any organization is dependent on a number of factors such as the use of appropriate technology,

adequate motivation, adequate resources, which includes optimum use of fund, materials and personnel, and positive work ethics and the professional and technical competence of the workers. The above, however eluded the

Nigerian local government system as the system is confronted with so many challenges which ranges from poor motivation of workers, attributed primarily to lack of fund, and high rate of corruption among the officials and the degree of manipulation of the local government affairs by the state government,

shortage of skilled manpower as a result of politicized nature of the recruitment procedure where misfits are recruited into the system which leads to low productivity and the negative work ethics common among the employees of the system in Nigeria which makes them unproductive.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

For any government to excel in its primary function of providing essential services to its people there is no doubt that it needs to sustain its method of revenue generation. Government at various levels in Nigeria tries to do. However, the performance of government with regards to income generation is far below expectation.

The reason for this is that the internal revenue generation machinery of government is not properly coordinated to the extent that it can efficiently achieve the objectives for which it was established to do. It has also been discovered that it is due to illiteracy as regards to the importance of revenue and procedures of its collection.

Nigeria whose responsibility is to generate internal revenue is usually faced with the following problems: (i) managerial problems with regard to revenue collection and distribution (most especially the lateness of civil servants to duty) and (ii) non contribution especially from rural area and better means of generating revenue.

RESEARCH QUESTION

1.     What are the sources of internal generated revenue?

2.     Why is the revenue generation in the public sector poor?

3.     What are the managerial problems militating against effective internally generated revenue?

4.     What are the causes and the problems encountered in the course of internal revenue generation?

AIMS AND OBJECTIVE OF STUDY

The main objective of the study is to examine the problems and prospects of internally generated revenue in the public sector. The objectives are:

1.     To ascertain the sources of internal generated revenue.

2.     To ascertain why the revenue generation in the public sector is poor.

3.     To examine the managerial problems militating against effective internally generated revenue.

4.     To ascertain the causes and the problems encountered in the course of internal revenue generation.

SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The idea of the research work is to study the possible implication of civil servants lateness to duty on internal generated revenue. This research work an