President Muhammadu Buhari has mandated ministries, departments, agencies and business enterprises to grant access to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) to their systems for the purposes of tax collection nationwide.
\u00a0President Buhari issued the mandate on Thursday while delivering his address as the Special Guest of Honour at the First Annual National Tax Dialogue organized by the FIRS at the old Banquet Hall, Aso Rock Villa Abuja. The theme of the dialogue was \u201cTaxation in a post-Covid Economy\u201d
\u00a0The President also mandated the FIRS to \u201cspeedily put all measures in place to fully implement programmes to stamp out Base Erosion and Profit Shifting in all of its ramifications and generally automate its tax processes.\u201d
\u00a0In addition, President Buhari urged the FIRS to fast-track its digitalization of the tax collection process.
The President said: \u201cI have directed all government agencies and business enterprises to grant FIRS access to their systems for seamless connection. We all are now living in a fast digitalising world. As such, business transactions are continually being migrated from \u201cbrick and mortar\u201d locations to digital places or spaces.\u00a0 It is therefore incumbent upon tax authorities to adopt digital means to efficiently track taxable transactions for the purpose of collecting taxes.\u00a0 In order to provide the necessary legislative framework for the adoption of technology in tax administration, we also made necessary amendments to the FIRS Establishment Act in the Finance Act 2020.\u201d
\u00a0Also, President, African Development Bank (AfDB), Mr. Akinwunmi Adesina, who delivered the keynote address at the Tax Dialogue, gave assurances that the AfDB would support the FIRS to modernise the tax collection processes in Nigeria through capacity building.
\u00a0In her opening remarks at the Dialogue, Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Shamusuna Ahmed, highlighted some provisions of the Finance Act 2020, stating that a number of these provisions were enshrined in the Act in order to help businesses, especially SMEs, recover from the adverse effects of COVID-19.
\u00a0\u00a0She said tax compliance was key to national prosperity, stressing that government was determined to minimise the incidence of tax dodging through suck leakages as cross-border transactions through maximum use of technology.
\u00a0The Finance Minister urged the audience to generously contribute their ideas during the dialogue in order to improve the nation\u2019s tax system.
In his Welcome Address at the event, Executive Chairman, FIRS, Mr. Muhammad Nami, underscored the importance of the dialogue, saying: The universal collapse of traditional government revenue sources and the consequential resort to tax is a testimony.\u00a0 The well-known arms race among nations is gradually giving way to \u201ctax-race\u201d.\u00a0 The international struggle for and against digital services tax is just the beginning of the tax race.\u00a0 It is a race for all nations \u2013 developed or developing.\u00a0 And for Nigeria, it is \u201ca must-win\u201d race.\u201d
\u00a0Mr. Nami stressed that the FIRS would match on to digitalise the tax process fully and canvassed the cooperation of the three tiers of government, the citizens and corporate organisations in the country for the success of the digitalization drive.
\u00a0His words: “The FIRS started the journey to automation several years ago when it launched \u201cProject Fact\u201d.\u00a0 Several other initiatives were launched to further take advantage of evolving technology in taxpayer registration, online payment platforms, remote filing of returns, etc.\u00a0 However, there was very limited success with the various initiatives due to inadequate statutory framework. \u00a0
\u201cA quantum leap was achieved with the 2020 Finance Act which copiously provided legal grounds for deployment of technology in tax administration.\u00a0 The Service is grateful to the President, the leadership of the National Assembly, the Honourable Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning and all other stakeholders that worked together to enact the necessary laws.
\u00a0\u201cThe Service is taking advantage of the new law to embark on studies (with the assistance of friendly tax authorities and international tax organisations) with a view to developing a robust digitalisation roadmap.\u00a0 The roadmap will enable the Service to digitalise its whole operations (end-to-end) in a systematic, coherent and efficient manner.
\u00a0\u201cThere is so much to look forward to in the coming years.\u00a0 The FIRS is starting this decade with the resolve to leapfrog tax administration into the digital age. Ladies and gentlemen, we are banking on your continued support as we embark on this onerous journey.
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President Muhammadu Buhari has mandated ministries, departments, agencies and business enterprises to grant access to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) to their systems for the purposes of tax collection nationwide. \u00a0President Buhari issued the mandate on Thursday while delivering his address as the Special Guest of Honour at the First Annual National Tax Dialogue […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":14404,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,7],"tags":[31,125,1210],"class_list":["post-30828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","category-news","tag-buhari","tag-firs","tag-mdas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30828\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}