HoR Passes Tax Reforms Bills for second reading
By Tom Okpe
The House of Representatives has passed through second reading the four tax reforms Bills, initiated by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
The Bills which includes, Nigeria Tax; Nigeria Tax Administration; Nigeria Revenue Service and Joint Revenue Board of Nigeria, Establishment Bills, 2024 we’re read by the Speaker, Rep Tanudeen Abbas, at plenary on Wednesday.
In a lead debate on the general principles of the Bills, the House Leader, Rep Julius Ihonvbere, APC, Edo, commended President Tinubu for the courage to address the challenges in the tax sector.
Ihonvbere said Bills will ensure a total overhaul and modernisation of the tax system which was chronically, outdated and one of the most backwards, and drive the economic transformation.
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He said: “The focus of the tax reform Bills essentially is to ensure a total overhaul and modernisation of the tax system which is chronically outdated and one of the most backwards on earth. To drive the economic transformation that we will all be part of, trying to refocus, redirect the principles of production and accumulation and exchange in order to improve lives of the ordinary persons, empower our citizens and support households.
“The Nigerian Tax administration Bill provides legal basis for tax management. The Nigerian Revenue Establishment bill replaced the FIRS to perform the role of Revenue administration and finally the joint revenue board establishment bill to transform joint tax board into the joint revenue board with expanded mandate and responsibilities. These are the taxes we are putting into one because they’re dealing with the same matter.
“Enhance revenue mobilisation and ensure a conducive and competitive environment for investment. Many can complain that investors have being paying taxes to almost 10 and sometimes 15 different agencies without receipts sometimes.
“Ordinary Nigerians, the youths and families will benefit extensively from the Bills because, for the first time, there will be a complete exemption of low income workers earning up to N1million from PAYEE.
“The minimum wage, about N83,000 a month, anybody with this minimum wage, whether in the public or private sector will not need to pay that tax. It reduces the PAYEE tax for those earning a monthly salary of N1.7 million or less.
“Remove VAT on food, healthcare, education, electricity generation and transmission. If you are involved in these activities it is 0 percent VAT. There’s tax incentives for employers to hire more workers.
“There are many products that are now exempted from the VAT; dairy products, renewable energy and others. Our small businesses also have a lot of incentives in this new tax regime.
“There is also the introduction of the office of the Tax Ombuds to protect vulnerable tax payers against arbitrary tax assessment. The bill also requires that all tax disputes must be resolved by the Ombuds in 14 days not the current situation where in a year you will be going to tax office everyday and they’ll be turning you up and down with no solution,” he added.
While supporting that the bills be read for the second time, the House minority leader, Hon. Kinsley Chinda, PDP, said the issues inherent in the proposed legislation would be addressed at the appropriate stage.
“I will not want to repeat save to say or emphasise on a few areas. We have incremental tax contained in the tax administration law, rather than have tax increase, it is impossible that we can have incremental VAT in this bill. Aside, all the other issues or the issues of conflict with the constitution and other laws and then the issues of ambiguity, I believe that we can tidy them up.
“One good thing is that, innovation is coming, it would be difficult but it is desirable. So, while we oppose some of the letters of the law, we support the spirit of the law in toto.
“As a parliament, we know the stage at which we can attack those letters and correct them and we want to assure Nigerians that as we stand as members of this parliament, these letters, we will monitor them as watchdogs and ensure that those letters are collected as we have promised.
“Generally, we support these Bills. Mr Speaker, my dear colleagues since we all agree with the spirit and intent of the Bills, I will pray that we support its second reading,” he said.
