FIRS makes N3.2trn revenue from non-oil sector tax in nine months

The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) has detailed its mandate towards diversifying the tax and revenue sources accruable to the Federal Government.

Mohammed Nami, the FIRS Executive Chairman made this known on Tuesday during an interview with Arise TV monitored by Ripples Nigeria.

According to Nami, a total of N4.2 trillion has been accrued by the agency so far in 2021 with the non-oil sector contributing N3.2 trillion of the amount.

“The bottomline is that there are issues with the oil and gas sector and the conversation is whether the country’s economy is being diversified which is true. If it is analysed from the FIRS perspective with respect to tax remittance, we have collected N4.2trn in taxes in 2021 so far. N3.2 trn from non-oil taxes while the remaining from oil.

“This diversification is required for the Federal Government to fund the budgetary requirements which is why the FIRS is working to explore non-oil taxes for the benefit of the economy. The FIRS has also ensured the strict adherence to previously-ignored taxes in our laws due to the oil windfall from independence,” Nami explained.

Read also: Only 41m people pay tax in Nigeria — FIRS

The FIRS boss further noted the usage of technology towards ensuring compliance in tax payment amongst defaulters and virtual businesses.

“FIRS also unbundled the tax administration processes; this means separating overlapping functions within the agency. This led to creation of intelligence, strategic data mining departments within the agency in order to achieve this mandate. These departments are important due to the digitalisation of the modern world which led to a lot of virtual businesses who must be taxed.

“We have deployed technology which reveals defaulters based on the data of their activities, both online and offline. This will help the FIRS towards addressing the challenge of tax defaulting. The attitude of tax avoidance is entrenched among the corporate sectors due to the lax attitude of the previous government and the rich windfall from the oil sector,” he stated.

Join the conversation

Opinions

Support Ripples Nigeria, hold up solutions journalism

Balanced, fearless journalism driven by data comes at huge financial costs.

As a media platform, we hold leadership accountable and will not trade the right to press freedom and free speech for a piece of cake.

If you like what we do, and are ready to uphold solutions journalism, kindly donate to the Ripples Nigeria cause.

Your support would help to ensure that citizens and institutions continue to have free access to credible and reliable information for societal development.

Donate Now