Segun Atanda/
The Chairman of the Presidential Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms Committee, Taiwo Oyedele, has rejected claims that Nigeria’s newly enacted tax reform laws were secretly altered after being passed by the National Assembly.
Oyedele was responding to growing calls by civil society organisations and some lawmakers for an independent investigation into alleged discrepancies between the versions of the tax bills debated by legislators and those later gazetted.
Opposition figures, including former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and the Labour Party’s 2023 presidential candidate, Peter Obi, have also urged the Federal Government to suspend the implementation of the laws.
The controversy was triggered last week when a member of the House of Representatives, Abdulsamad Dasuki, alleged that the tax laws signed into effect differed from what lawmakers approved.
Dasuki argued that the changes amounted to a violation of the legislature’s authority, insisting that the gazetted versions did not reflect deliberations on the floor of the House.
Speaking on Channels Television’s Morning Brief on Monday, Oyedele described the claims circulating in the media as misleading, arguing that there was no verified basis for comparing the two versions.
“Before you can say there is a difference between what was gazetted and what was passed, we have what has not been gazetted. We don’t have what was passed,” he said.
Oyedele explained that the only authoritative record of what the National Assembly approved was the harmonised version of the bills certified by the Clerk of the legislature and transmitted to the President.
“The official harmonised bills certified by the clerk, which the National Assembly sent to the President, we don’t have a copy to compare. Only the lawmakers can say authoritatively what was sent,” he said.
“It should be the House of Representatives or Senate version. It should be the harmonised version certified by the clerk. Even me, I cannot say that I have it. I only have what was presented to Mr President to sign.”
Addressing concerns over a contentious provision, Section 41(8), which was reported to mandate a 20 percent deposit, Oyedele said the matter had been misrepresented.
“I know that particular provision is not in the final gazette, but it was in the draft gazette,” he said. “Some people decided that they should write the report of the committee before the committee had met, and it had circulated everywhere.”
According to him, the House of Representatives committee involved later confirmed that it had not deliberated on the issue at the time the report was circulated.
“What is out there in the media did not come from the committee set up by the House of Representatives. I think we should allow them do the investigation,” Oyedele added.
President Bola Tinubu recently signed four tax reform bills into law, describing them as the most far-reaching overhaul of Nigeria’s tax system in decades. The laws are scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2026.
They include the Nigeria Tax Act, the Nigeria Tax Administration Act, the Nigeria Revenue Service (Establishment) Act, and the Joint Revenue Board (Establishment) Act, all of which place tax administration under a single authority, the Nigeria Revenue Service.
The reforms aim to simplify tax compliance, broaden the tax base, eliminate multiple taxation, and modernise revenue collection across federal, state and local governments, despite opposition from some lawmakers, particularly from northern states, during the legislative process.
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