Why self-employed Nigerians should pay tax – Rep

A member of the House of Representatives, Olufemi Fakeye has said that the Federal Government should impose a tax on self-employed Nigerians because they allegedly earn lots of money.

Fakeye said this on Wednesday while commenting on the 2022 budget during the plenary session on the floor of the house stating that it would enable the federal government to boost its revenue.

He said, “I’m aware right now and it has been said here that only two quarterly releases have been made now, we are in the last quarter of the year. That makes a joke of all the effort that we put in day in, day out to ensure that the budget is passed on time.

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“I pay attention to revenue shortfalls for the government. I recall when I was young, everybody paid taxes. Whether you are a farmer, your daddy was a carpenter, whatever he did for a living, he paid tax.

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“Now we have tended to forgive everybody their taxation except those who have an income where the tax is taken out of your income and the rest paid to you.

“I think our tax reform should be such that every Nigerian has a chance to contribute. Go out there and talk to 80 per cent or 90 per cent of the people of Nigeria, a lot of them who are self-employed; they don’t pay tax anymore.”

He continued, “So when we hear the Federal Inland Revenue Service or tax organisations, or even the tax joint boards are widening the tax net, why do they shy away from finding a way to make people pay — whether you are a carpenter, taxi driver, you are selling rice in the market or not. These people make a lot of money but they don’t get to pay anything. So I think that is an area I would like to see revenue-boosting”.

Small companies with an annual turnover of not more than N25 million are exempt from paying the Company Income Tax under the Finance Act 2020.