The Federal Government has set up an Inter-Ministeral committee to recover outstanding tax liabilities collected between January 2016 and May this year.
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha inaugurated the committee in Abuja.
Mustapha, while inaugurating the committee, charged them to ensure that they recover all Stamp Duties collected on behalf of the Federal Government but yet to be remitted by governnment agencies, banks and other companies.
He said the need to recover the Stamp Duty became imperative, owing to the dwindling revenue of government, which was caused by the negative impact of the Coronavirus pandemic.
He said the impact of the pandemic had led to a budget deficit of over N5trn.
Mustapha said, “The government has recognised the fact that for any meaningful development to be achieved, it has to look inward to use every available means to shore up its revenue generating capacity.
“For too long, the country has depended on oil as the main cash cow of the economy even though it is richly endowed with other viable revenue yielding sources.
“In the face of dwindling oil revenue, it is even more compelling now to begin to think out of the box in order to safeguard the future of our country.”
He said the administration had resolved to widen the revenue base by activating the Stamp Duty revenue collection, which had been neglected for more than 20 years.
The SGF said the revenue from Stamp Duty would be focused on by the government as it had the potential to yield up to N1trn annually if properly harnessed.
He said the committee was being inaugurated to serve as a timely intervention to augment the Federal Government’s revenue generation capacity while avoiding a situation where the economy would slide back into recession.
The Executive Chairman of the FIRS, in a presentation at the event, said that the agency was prepared to reposition Stamp Duties as the next major revenue source for Nigeria.
Nami said as revenue from oil and gas continued to dwindle due to global fall on demand and price, indirect taxes such as Stamp Duty remained the viable and sustainable alternative revenue source for funding budgetary requirements.
He said that between January and May this year, the total Stamp Duty remitted into the federation account was about N66bn, as against N18bn generated in the entire 2019 fiscal period.
Giving a breakdown of the N66bn, he said N20bn was remitted by Deposit Money Banks, while N39bn was the amount warehoused by the CBN, which had now been remitted to the federation account.
In addition, he said that N7.9bn represented Stamp Duties revenue from stamping of various instruments.
He attributed the rise in stamp duty collection to the dynamism triggered by the Finance Act of 2019.
The Senate President in his comments said the Senate was not unaware of the various changes against the efforts of the FIRS to rejig tax administration in the country
He said the National Assembly would continue to encourage and support the initiatives and efforts of revenue generating agencies to improve their revenue collections, especially in these trying times.
“The National Assembly will continue to provide the necessary legislative backings and oversight functions that will help maximise the revenue of governnment and ensure that government is better,” Lawan added.
In his address of goodwill at the event, the Minister of Justice said, following the inadequacies in operation of law and exercise of authority on stamp duty, certain backlog of generated revenue were unaccounted for.
This, he said, has made it imperative for the amount to be recovered for the Federal Government.
