Whose idea is this? How much universal coverage has the Federal Inland Revenue Service achieved based on the current 5% VAT rate? Has the FIRS given up and chosen rather to tax only the hitherto compliant some more? That would be a disaster.
Moreover the media is creating the false impression that the idea of an increase in VAT rate lies within the administrative purview of only the Executive in general or the FIRS in particular. If you run out of money, just increase taxes. This is not correct.
Taxes, any taxes, just like budgets, are based on bills passed by both houses of parliament signed into law by the President. Hence we have long way to go on this issue. Government(s) with poor record of accountability should expect strident opposition to this proposal. If the free-loading members of the House approves it, to shore up their profligate lifestyles, they would have clearly re-confirmed their anti-people stance.
The FIRS and their beggarly state government counterparts should close all tax evasion and tax avoidance loopholes and extend the taxation net to rope in more and more people especially at the upper end.
Finally, we must realise that taxes from the bottom of the pyramid also matter a lot because of the huge population base. The truth is that the poor(?) are often forced to pay a ruinous plethora of "taxes" and levies which end up in private pockets. Ask any Okada or Keke rider or danfo or molue driver or market stall trader or street vendor, etc. . If only the state can get 20 to 30% of what these victims shell out routinely to the many mafia in our midst! I do not expect the mafia to give in without a fight. But fight we must.
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