ICTA initiated launch of CMC online tax payment system, evidence of President’s statesmanship: Minis

Friday, 10 January 2014 01:35 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Unprecedented successes of the UNP-administered Colombo Municipal Council nowadays are an evidence of the statesmanship of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, says Local Government and Provincial Council Minister A.L.M. Athaullah The Minister said so while inaugurating the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) initiated Colombo Municipal Council (CMC) online tax payment system on Wednesday. Addressing the large gathering at the councillors’ room on this occasion the Minister said that President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s magnanimity in leading the country was accentuated by the success of the activities of the Colombo Municipal Council. Although the CMC was under the UNP administration, it received maximum boost to its development plans. The Minister also paid a glowing tribute to CMC mayor A.J.M. Muzammil and commended his versatility and in particular, his talent for relating to people. Speaking on this occasion the Mayor stressed the importance of having the arrears (about Rs. 1,500 million) due to the CMC, made available to the CMC soon. He expressed the hope that technology would facilitate this. He also stressed the need to have an online link that could make it more convenient for the CMC to receive the funds released by the Ministry.

Speaking on this occasion ICTA Re-engineering Government Program Director Wasantha Deshapriya pointed out the importance of the mind in bringing about innovation to make people’s lives easy. Resonating Winston Churchill’s words: “The empires of the future are the empires of the mind,” he emphasised that the possibilities of innovation for greater convenience of the public were enormous. CMC Commissioner Bhadrani Jayawardhane speaking on the occasion said that the Mayor always encouraged innovative thinking. He would induce innovative thinking for better public service. One of his buoyant sayings in his bid to encourage new thinking was “Dream about it”. She said that good relationships helped build success in public service. She commended the use the CMC Treasurer K.D. Chitrapala made of his contacts from his Samurdhi days for the success of the CMC online tax payment system. CMC Treasurer K.D. Chitrapala thanked all who contributed to the success of the CMC online payment system. He mentioned how the CMC Commissioner’s encouraging words “work on it as if it is approved” helped to boost the morale of the CMC staff in contributing towards better public service. Local Government and Provincial Council Ministry Secretary R.A.A.K. Ranawake and ICTA CEO Reshan Dewapura also participated in the occasion. ICTA e-Services, Re-engineering Government Program Head Kanchana Thudugala and e-Government Project Manager Chintake Ranasinghe who contributed much for the ICTA component of the CMC online tax payment system were also present. The Colombo Municipal Council and the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) had signed the relevant MoU on 5 December to enable Colombo City tax payers to pay several categories of CMC taxes online. Accordingly CMC tax payments which do not require any supplementary documents/manual interventions could now (from Wednesday 8 January 2014) be made online. For this tax payers are required to provide the CMC account number and the relevant street name and assessment number. Among the tax categories for which this online payment could be made are the following: (1) Rates payments, (2) Trade tax, (3) Tax on businesses, (4) Market rental, (5) House rental, (6) Shops and boutiques rental and (7) Hawkers’ rental. The modus operandi is simple and includes logging in and entering the payment type http://www.eservice.cmc.lk/cmc-citizen-web/Payments/OnlinePayments. Objectives The CMC intends to offer the eServices including the seven payment services mentioned above and the Information service consisting in online payment records (reconciliation report for the Accountant) (CMC Web) to the stakeholders by leveraging the Lanka Gate infrastructure. The ICTA will provide the required technical and advisory services for implementing the identified eServices. Security ICTA shall ensure that all possible security concerns related to data sharing and connecting to internal systems are addressed in a comprehensive manner through assessments carried out by Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Readiness Team (SL CERT, www.slcert.gov.lk). Extension ICTA will extend Lanka Gate components such as the Country Portal, 1919-GovSMS and the Lanka Interoperability Exchange (LIX) which is the data exchange Enterprise Service Bus to enable the CMC to offer eServices to CMC stakeholders efficiently and in a secure manner leveraging multiple delivery channels. ICTA will extend the Lanka Gate IPG service to enable the CMC to accept payments online for any transactional eServices offered by ITL. According to the Cabinet decision dated 23 December 2009 and consequent FR Circular No 447, ICTA will also facilitate acceptance of electronic payment over-the counter, if requested by the CMC.