Thursday 18 September 2014

Nigeria records N28.67b revenue shortfall in August, as FG, states, LGs share N611.77b

WorldStage Newsonline—Nigeria recorded a N28.67 billion shortfall in revenue in August, as the total revenue dropped to N601.648 billion from N630.325 billion collected in the preceding  month.

The August revenue profile sustained the streak of revenue shortfalls into the account being witnessed over the past months.

This is even as the three tiers of government also shared N611.77 billion from Statutory, Value Added Tax, VAT, and other revenue sources in the month of August, an amount which was about N77.17 billion deficit variance from what was budgeted for the month.

Briefing the media at the end of the two-day Federation Accounts Allocation Committee’s, FAAC’s, meeting in Abuja, the Minister of State for Finance, Amb. Bashir Yuguda, attributed the revenue shortfall  largely to  Force Majeure declared by Shell and series of shutdown of Trunklines and Pipelines and various terminals .


He however explained that government was doing its best to shore up the tax revenue profiles in the face of dwindling earnings from the oil and gas sector in order to meet increasing funding needs of all the tiers of government.

For instance, the minister said tax payments and returns by some bluechip companies and increase in the receipt of foreign Companies Income Tax, CIT, boosted non-oil revenue for the month under review.

Yuguda explained that the various revenue agencies had been asked to intensify their tax revenue drives, adding that the immediate results of the various capacity building for all the agencies were the increasing tax collections in recent months to the Federation Accounts.

The minister, who disclosed this while responding to media enquiries about tax remittances by the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas, NLNG, the Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited, SPDC, and debt payments by the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, said government was satisfied with the tax and other remittances being made to the government over the past months.

He also clarified that the incidence of pipelines vandalism which remained one of the biggest sources of revenue losses to government was already being addressed by the Presidential Committee set up to tackle the challenge and assured that with the cooperation of all stakeholders, the country would overcome the challenge.

He said: “The Presidential Committee on pipeline vandalism is working with the various security agencies to stem the incidence of pipeline vandalism. So, the incidence has abated and if you observe you will note that in recent times we have not been having increase in pipeline vandalism. So, the Committee is working, they are working with all the security agencies of government and we believe that with the cooperation of all, we should be able to overcome that problem.

“On NLNG, you know business is dynamic. So, there is no standing formula for the amount of revenue that we collect as tax from NLNG. It depends on the level of their operations and the level of activities that happen within the NLNG. They have started paying that and they are doing well and if you remember recently, there is capacity building on the part of the FIRS.

 “We target additional N75 billion coming into government coffers through taxation. So far, it has been increased by N40 billion. So, through all agencies of government we are working hard to make sure that we are all tax compliant in your filing system and your payment system to be in order. So, I believe we will see more revenue stream coming in to government coffers from our tax system.”

On the revenues distributed to the tiers of government, the minister said that the Federal, State and Local Governments shared a total of N504.705 billion from statutory distributions, N61.513 billion from VAT and N35.549 billion from the SURE-P programme.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of State Commissioners of Finance Forum, the Chairman of the Finance Commissioners’ Forum Mr Timothy Odaah, who restated the Forum’s call for total removal of fuel subsidy during a post-meeting chat with journalists, said the increasingly dwindling revenue accruals to the Federation Account called for urgent action by the State Governments.

Odaah, who confirmed that discussions were ongoing at the State Finance Commissioners level to explore the internally generated revenue potentials of the sub-national governments based on the economic peculiarities, maintained that outright removal of fuel subsidy would benefits the states more as whatever is being saved from it could better be channelled to developmental projects of the states through FAAC monthly distributions.WorldStage Newsonline—Nigeria recorded a N28.67 billion shortfall in revenue in August, as the total revenue dropped to N601.648 billion from N630.325 billion collected in the preceding  month.

The August revenue profile sustained the streak of revenue shortfalls into the account being witnessed over the past months.

This is even as the three tiers of government also shared N611.77 billion from Statutory, Value Added Tax, VAT, and other revenue sources in the month of August, an amount which was about N77.17 billion deficit variance from what was budgeted for the month.

Briefing the media at the end of the two-day Federation Accounts Allocation Committee’s, FAAC’s, meeting in Abuja, the Minister of State for Finance, Amb. Bashir Yuguda, attributed the revenue shortfall  largely to  Force Majeure declared by Shell and series of shutdown of Trunklines and Pipelines and various terminals .

He however explained that government was doing its best to shore up the tax revenue profiles in the face of dwindling earnings from the oil and gas sector in order to meet increasing funding needs of all the tiers of government.

For instance, the minister said tax payments and returns by some bluechip companies and increase in the receipt of foreign Companies Income Tax, CIT, boosted non-oil revenue for the month under review.

Yuguda explained that the various revenue agencies had been asked to intensify their tax revenue drives, adding that the immediate results of the various capacity building for all the agencies were the increasing tax collections in recent months to the Federation Accounts.

The minister, who disclosed this while responding to media enquiries about tax remittances by the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas, NLNG, the Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited, SPDC, and debt payments by the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, said government was satisfied with the tax and other remittances being made to the government over the past months.

He also clarified that the incidence of pipelines vandalism which remained one of the biggest sources of revenue losses to government was already being addressed by the Presidential Committee set up to tackle the challenge and assured that with the cooperation of all stakeholders, the country would overcome the challenge.

He said: “The Presidential Committee on pipeline vandalism is working with the various security agencies to stem the incidence of pipeline vandalism. So, the incidence has abated and if you observe you will note that in recent times we have not been having increase in pipeline vandalism. So, the Committee is working, they are working with all the security agencies of government and we believe that with the cooperation of all, we should be able to overcome that problem.

“On NLNG, you know business is dynamic. So, there is no standing formula for the amount of revenue that we collect as tax from NLNG. It depends on the level of their operations and the level of activities that happen within the NLNG. They have started paying that and they are doing well and if you remember recently, there is capacity building on the part of the FIRS.

 “We target additional N75 billion coming into government coffers through taxation. So far, it has been increased by N40 billion. So, through all agencies of government we are working hard to make sure that we are all tax compliant in your filing system and your payment system to be in order. So, I believe we will see more revenue stream coming in to government coffers from our tax system.”

On the revenues distributed to the tiers of government, the minister said that the Federal, State and Local Governments shared a total of N504.705 billion from statutory distributions, N61.513 billion from VAT and N35.549 billion from the SURE-P programme.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of State Commissioners of Finance Forum, the Chairman of the Finance Commissioners’ Forum Mr Timothy Odaah, who restated the Forum’s call for total removal of fuel subsidy during a post-meeting chat with journalists, said the increasingly dwindling revenue accruals to the Federation Account called for urgent action by the State Governments.

Odaah, who confirmed that discussions were ongoing at the State Finance Commissioners level to explore the internally generated revenue potentials of the sub-national governments based on the economic peculiarities, maintained that outright removal of fuel subsidy would benefits the states more as whatever is being saved from it could better be channelled to developmental projects of the states through FAAC monthly distributions.

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