Kennedy Iwundu, Chairman, Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria, Abuja chapter, says multiple taxation by several government agencies is forcing investors to resort to importation.
He spoke at the CITN Week with the theme: “Tax Reforms Digitalisation and Its Impact on Doing Business In Nigeria.”
According to Iwundu at the event in Abuja on Thursday, some investors have decided to import instead of setting up companies for production because of multiple taxation.
He said as tax professionals, there was the need to put up discussions on the current tax system and proffer solutions, which should be forwarded for tax law reforms.
He said a situation where the Federal, State and Local Government Areas each have a long list of taxes and levies to collect was inimical to business growth.
He said such multiple taxation usually discouraged both foreign and local investments coming into the Nigerian economy.
He said the current tax system which had multiple federal taxes such as company income tax, levy on profit of companies apart from other sectorial collections posed serious problem to investors.
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Iwundu commended President Bola Tinubu for suspending the telecom and green taxes by setting up a committee to look into tax reforms so as to ensure that multiple taxation was eliminated.
He said the move would also ensure that tax laws and administration conformed with Nigeria’s tax policy.
He said the Nigeria tax collection had become a crucial policy of the government impact of tax reforms and digitalisation on government income in Nigeria, describing it as a great and positive one.
Iwundu added: “In 2022, the Federal Inland Revenue Service generated N10.1 trillion revenue, which has been recorded as highest in the history of the country.
“This is attributed to the impact of tax reforms and tax digitalisation.
“One of the reforms and digitalisation initiative is the introduction of administrative automation system by FIRS called Amanda.”
This, according to him, has now been replaced by Taxpromax, adding that the Finance Act introduced tax reforms which empowers the FIRS to deploy digitalisation for revenue administration and collection.
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