Nigeria has hunted down 700,000 firms that have never paid
taxes. The country with a population of about 180 million, slipped
into recession in August for the first time in more than 20 years.
It is now seeking to find new revenue sources to compensate
for low oil prices.
But it is an uphill task trying to get Nigerians to pay
their taxes, considering that 80% the workforce is employed in the
informal sector.
Tunde Fowler, executive chairman of the Federal Inland
Revenue Service (Firs), said the aim was to bring the total number of
registered individuals to 20 million by the end of the year:
"We have been
able to add about 700,000 companies and we expect to add about 10 million
individuals across the nation [by December]." , the Reuters news
agency quotes its tax chief as saying.
He told Reuters there were plans to twin tougher
enforcement with a waiver on interest and penalties for the period 2012-2015:
“We will give them
a 45-day window to come forward and register and that will make them eligible
for that waiver.
A lot of people who
are not in the tax net are a bit jittery or afraid to come and register,
thinking that we might go back two or three years and the amounts might be
considerable."
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