SHOCKING! FIRS sets N4.957trn target for 2016

ABUJA— In a swift response to the continued drop in oil price and uncertainty in the market, the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, has proposed a revenue generation target of N4.957 trillion for 2016.

Executive Chairman of the agency, Dr. Tunde Fowler, disclosed this, yesterday, at the opening of the Federal Inland Revenue Service 2016 Corporate Strategy Retreat, with the theme: “Optimizing non-oil tax revenue collection through compliance and enforcement,” in Abuja.

The FIRS boss also announced that the FIRS had registered about 361,451 new corporate taxpayers within the last three months while targeting another 500,000 new corporate taxpayers by end of the first quarter of 2016.

He attributed the feat to the nationwide taxpayer registration, Value Added Tax (VAT) and Withholding Tax Monitoring (WTM) being undertaken by FIRS, alongside tax enlightenment and publicity campaigns, anchored by the FIRS Federal Engagement and Enlightenment Tax Teams, FEETT.

In addition to the above feat, he said the agency was leveraging heavily on technological tools to aid compliance by taxpayers and to enable the agency monitor and capture all taxable transactions as they occur.

The executive chairman, however, explained that the N4,957 trillion target for 2016 would be largely dependent on non-oil collection and in particular VAT, which will account for N2 trillion and CIT expected to account for Nl.877 trillion.

“We have proposed a revenue target of  N4.957 trillion  for 2016. This target is largely dependent on non-oil collection and in particular, VAT and CIT,” he said.