Prime Minister Guillaume Soro on Wednesday opened a vehicle registration office in the Ivory Coast town of Bouake, marking a return of the tax administration to the rebel-held north.
Soro, who is also secretary general of the ex-rebel New Forces (FN), inaugurated the building that will house the internal revenue and customs services as well as the vehicle registration centre.
"Today, we're in a new phase of reuniting the state coffers," Soro said at a ceremony attended by many foreign African and European diplomats, because for six years, conflict and its aftermath has ruled out state taxation in half the country.
Financial and fiscal reunification of Ivory Coast was one of the important parts of the latest peace accords for the cocoa-rich west African nation signed last December in Ouagadougou, capital of neighbouring Burkina Faso.
The FN has controlled the northern half of the country, once the economic powerhouse of the region, since civil war followed an unsuccessful coup bid against President Laurent Gbagbo late in 2002.
While the FN held sway in the north, it levied all kinds of taxes in the absence of a legal administration. Ivory Coast is a leading exporter of cocoa, cashew nuts and has some reserves of diamonds and gold.
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