The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) will take over the collection of taxes by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC) and 61 other tax collection agencies of the federal government.
This was revealed by the head of the Presidential Committee on Tax Policy and Fiscal Reforms, Taiwo Oyedele in an interview with Channels TV on Wednesday.
According to him, while the FIRS takes over tax collection from the Customs, the NCS would focus on trade facilitation and border protection adding that, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) will also concentrate more on its core mandate of regulating telecommunications not to collect revenue.
He said, “Ironically, our cost of collection is one of the highest, and the reason for that is that we’ve got all manners of agencies. The federal government alone, we have 63 MDAs that were given revenue targets last year.
“On one hand, these agencies are being distracted from doing their primary function, which is to facilitate the economy. Number two, they were not set up to collect revenue. So, they won’t be able to collect revenue efficiently.
“So, move those revenue collection functions to the FIRS. It has two advantages: the cost of collection and efficiency will improve, these guys will focus on their work and the economy will benefit as a result.”
