The Chairman of the Presidential Committee on Tax and Fiscal Policy Reform, Taiwo Oyedele, said on Friday that he is worried about Nigeria losing the sum of N6 trillion a year in tax waivers.
Oyedele raised this concern in an interview on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily as he spoke about the implications of Nigeria losing the same N6 trillion it generates in revenue on an annual basis.
While also addressing the issue of tax waivers, he stated that the government at all levels has failed to measure their impact on the economy of the country.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, we are giving away about N6 trillion annually,” the financial expert said in his confirmation of the figure, which the Senate recently quoted as tax waivers.
“On the economic viability of the enormous tax waivers, the country has so far failed to measure their impact on the economy.
“This is really the part that makes it painful because it would then appear like you just wasted the money you didn’t even have in the first place, and those numbers are huge compared to our revenue base.
“If we were a country where we’re making N60, N70 trillion and we give away N6 trillion, maybe we would say, ‘We can live with it.’
“But the revenue generated by the FIRS in 2021, the year before the last, was just barely N6 trillion. And then you give that away in tax waivers and incentives.”
