According to the acting Executive Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Mr. Sunday Ogungbesan, the service had generated a staggering sum of N1.842 trillion from taxes into the federation account within a short time frame of 6 months.
It was good news for the Federal Government when the acting Executive Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Mr. Sunday Ogungbesan made a shocking revelation that the service has generated a sum of N1.842 trillion from taxes into the federation account within a space of 6 months.
This was revealed yesterday, 2nd of July, 2015 during a briefing with the Senate President, Bukola Saraki alongside senior officials of the FIRS. He revealed the possibility of generating a bigger figure for the federation account without the social, political and economic challenges the country is struggling with which has affected the flow of revenues.
Furthermore, Odugbesan said the agency realised N697 billion as Petroleum Profit Tax; N778 billion as the Company Income Tax and N376 billion as Value Added Tax (VAT).
According to him, the agency was still expecting between N12 billion and N15 billion as import VAT from the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS), adding that the annual target of FIRS in the oil and gas sector is N1.4 trillion with additional N123.74 billion as its monthly target.
Furthermore, the FIRS boss said whereas N150 billion was collected from the oil sector in January and February, the figure went down to N93 billion in March.
He revealed further that the worse performance in the oil sector in the last 15 years was recorded in April when FIRS realised a paltry N50 billion as tax. He was however, swift to add that the trend improved in May and June when the revenues rose to N118 billion and N136 billion respectively.
He blamed the downturn recorded in April on the failure of three major oil companies to forward their reports to the agency following their complaints of high cost of production.
"We have oil but most of the foreign companies are not picking up our oil anymore because they have developed their own oil. Oil and gas which is key to the economy has not been doing too well. This is as a result of many factors. Many of these are completely outside our control. The price of oil in the international market has continued on the downward slide.
"Although it started gathering some momentum in the last three months. As at today, it is $59 per barrel. What is within our purview is basically what intervention we can make to shore up the revenues in the non-oil sector", Ogungbesan stated.
Senate President Bukola Saraki commended Mr. Sunday Ogungbesan for his great feat and advocated that Nigeria should look away from oil as revenue can also be generated from taxes which is stable and more reliable. According to him, Nigeria's over reliance on crude oil has been an impediment to the growth of the country.
He also discouraged the implementation of the luxury tax which he feels is very sensational.