move was part of measures by FIRS to meet its
The Federa vusatimes.cc l Inland
Revenue Service (FIRS) says it will soon begin collection of Value Added Tax
(VAT) on online transactions.
The Chairman of the
agency,
news Mr Babatunde Fowler, made the disclosure in an interview with the News
Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in New York on Saturday.
Fowler said: “soon, we
will ask bank
usanews.cc s to impose VAT on online transactions for purchases of goods and
services.
“Not that it is
something new; it actually should be in existence.
“We will certainly
follow up to make sure that every VAT that is due to be collected is
collected.”
He explained that the
move was part of measures by FIRS to meet its N8 trillion revenue target for
2019.
Fowler said the agency
had started taking action against companies and businesses that refused to
embrace the Federal Government’s tax amnesty programme.
According to him, FIRS
hopes to generate between N750 billion and N1 trillion from the clampdown,
which includes closure of defaulters’ bank accounts.
“We are going after
everybody. I am sure you have heard that we have placed lien on some accounts
of defaulters that have a billion naira turnover annually.
“So certainly, we are
not leaving anyone out of the tax net,” he said.
Officially known as the
Voluntary Asset and Income Declaration Scheme, the tax amnesty programme was
launched in 2017.
It gave tax defaulters a
one-year period of grace to declare and settle their unpaid taxes.
There have been
complaints by some taxpayers of being wrongly targeted by FIRS in the
clampdown.
Asked to comment on
that, Fowler admitted, blaming it on “administrative error,” arising from the
huge number of accounts involved.
“Well, there is
certainly one or two instances where we made administrative error, but when you
are looking at over 50,000 accounts, there is a tendency that sometimes an
error might be made.
“For those that we made
errors on, I wrote them personally apologising and of course we lifted the lien
on their accounts.”
On plans by the Joint
Tax Board to raise the country’s tax population to 45 million, Fowler said the
agency was relying on multiple information sources.
These, according to him,
include the country’s Bank Verification Number database and sister agencies
with relevant information.
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