Following the discovery of about N100bn as tax revenue shortfall by contractors to Ministries, Departments & Agencies (MDAs) between 2012 and 2017, the federal government has directed vendors of MDAs display their Tax Identification Numbers (TINs) on their invoices before payments are made to contractors by the MDAs.
The Minister of finance, Kemi Adeosun, who disclosed this, directed that the Accountant General of the Federation, Mr. Ahmed Idris, should ensure total compliance before any money is released.
The minister, in a memo titled ‘Compliance with Tax Payments by Federal Government Vendors.’ disclosed that persistent leakages in revenue remittances by vendors were uncovered by the Government’s Project Lighthouse, a system wide revenue intelligence data-warehouse.
She added that the directive to the government vendors was in compliance with the provisions of the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, and the Procurement Acts of 2007.
The Ministry of Finance, in a statement, lamented that this was eating deep into the revenue of government, especially at this time the country was recovering from recession.
The leakages, according to her, were due to lack of TIN particularly on Value Added Tax (VAT), Withholding Tax (WHT) and other related inflows into the government coffers.
“In order to address these lapses in the implementation of the 2017 budget as well as boost the revenue accruable to the government, all MDAs should be directed to insist that invoices submitted by vendors for payments must clearly state the TIN,” she said.
“This is to confirm tax compliance by relevant government vendors before payments are effected,” the Minister explained.
She noted that spot checks would be undertaken on MDAs to confirm compliance with the directive.