Guideline will spread to districts, says Maru

National Planning and Monitoring Minister Richard Maru says the benefits of the revised tax credit scheme guideline will spread to the country’s least-developed districts.
Speaking at the launching of the revised tax credit scheme guidelines on Thursday, Maru said it was purely for infrastructure.
He told private sector partners the scheme was for projects that were not part of the community service obligation.
“In the areas you operate in, within the special mining lease area or the petroleum licence area, these are your responsibilities.” Maru said.
“The cost should be part of your operating costs in your business.
“We are not going to take it up as Government.
“It’s very important that you understand that companies must take your share of responsibility as a good corporate citizen.”
Maru said he was working with Minister for Inter-Government Relations Kevin Isifu to bring to Cabinet an assessment of all districts.
“We are going to grade the districts: the most-developed and the least-developed,” he said.
“Cabinet will endorse the grading and scoring.
“As part of this process, I’m trying to have a more-fairer and equitable spread of benefits from our national wealth, giving priority to least-developed districts and those that are ranked poorly to bring up development indicators in respective districts of our country.”
Maru said the part of funding for the medium-term development plan three (MTDP three 2018-2022), with five-year investment plan which was estimated to cost about K27.2 billion, would come from the scheme.
He said provincial governments could submit applications through provincial executive councils, while districts directly through National Planning if the projects were part of MTDP III.
“This will work if you have a good relationship with resource companies in your electorates,” he said.
“We are looking for more resources companies to join the team of the willing, so we can expand the resource envelope.”
Maru urged other companies that were not part of the scheme to join.
“We want to deliver over a K1 billion in the next four years,” he said.
National Planning acting-Secretary Koney Samuel said with the new look guidelines of the scheme, Government expected a lot more impact.