The federal government Wednesday said it would commence moves to prosecute certain Nigerians who failed to take advantage of the windows created by the Voluntary Assets Income Declaration Scheme (VAIDS) policy to pay up their taxes before its expiration on June 30.
VAIDS was conceived by the federal government as a platform to encourage hitherto tax defaulters to voluntarily declare their assets and investments on which they had not been paying taxes and consequently regularise their tax payment.
Following an impressive response from the public towards the the policy, the initial March 31 deadline provided for compliance was extended to June 30. However, the extension notwithstanding, many still did not comply, prompting the government decision to conceive plans for the prosecution of such non-adherents and compel them to pay up with interests and penalties.
Making this disclosure while briefing journalists in the State House after a session with the Federal Executive Council (FEC), yesterday, the Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS), Babatunde Fowler, threatened that the Service would deploy available legal means to bring defaulters to justice.
He also disclosed that a plan had been put in place to unfold to the public the volume of investments in various projects through tax revenues with a view to encouraging more Nigerians to take interest in tax payment.
"The update is that it (VAIDS) expired June 30th, and anyone who has not come forth by now, we shall use all the legal means to make sure that we bring them to book and make sure that they pay the appropriate tax with interests and penalties.
"The federal government has through the Ministry of Information and also through the office of the vice-president has been talking about different projects that have been financed with tax revenues and I think as Nigerians begin to see those dividends of democracy, very good spending, people will be more encouraged to pay more taxes," Fowler added.
According to him, the level of compliance with VAIDS policy was very good, adding that collation of the output of the policy is currently ongoing at both the federal and state levels and would be made public by the middle of this month.
He said: "Well the response has been very good. We are collating all the figures both at the federal levels and the states levels and I believe that by the middle of July, we should be able to tell the nation the exact progress in terms of the numbers that have declared, amount that have been paid and amount that is going to be paid instalmentally."
Fowler debunked the allegation of the existence of multiple taxation, saying what rather exist
are user charges and not multiple taxation.
"Let me say once again that we do not really have a situation of multiple taxation. You only have multiple taxation when you pay the same tax to different tiers if government. What we have found out is that a lot of people categorize any payment to government as a tax. For example if you receive fine, a penalty they call it a tax. If you pay for the parking space, they call it a tax. Those are the things you refer to as user charges and not taxes," he explained.
Fowler disclosed that he had appeared before FEC through the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun for the ratification of a treaty known as automatic exchange of information which he said would give Nigeria the platform to exchange information with other countries with a view to making Nigerians who earn income abroad pay their taxes.
"I was here today to attend the meeting with the Minister of Finance to ratify the automatic exchange of information. Basically, what this means is that Nigeria as a country exchange financial information with other member countries which hopefully should improve our revenues and also ensure that all Nigerians that do have investments or businesses or incomes abroad will pay their taxes as and when due," he explained.
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