Former Minister of Finance, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, said the federal government was planning to increase the rate of value-added tax (VAT) to 7.5 per cent from the current five per cent by 2020. This is as the government seeks to shore up falling revenue.
Speaking at the Bloomberg Emerging & Frontier Forum in London, the former minister, whose tenure ended with President Muhammadu Buhari’s first term on May 29, said that her main preoccupation while in office was how to raise government’s revenue with only 55 per cent of targets being met.
Buhari, who was re-elected for a second four-year term, is yet to constitute a new cabinet. She said: “We have developed a strategic revenue growth initiative, which we have started to implement. “Our target is to increase revenue to 65 per cent minimum in 2019 so that in the next three years we are able to attain 80-85 per cent of our revenue target.”
However, earlier plans by government to increase VAT had been vehemently opposed by Nigerians. In April, following a public backlash, Executive Chairman, Federal Inland Revenue Service ((FIRS), Mr. Babatunde Fowler, refuted reports it had proposed a 50 per cent increase in VAT when he appeared before the National Assembly to defend the agency’s 2019 budget. But Fowler maintained that his position was misrepresented as he actually recommended an increase in the number of Nigerians and companies paying VAT and not the other way around.
