Mr Laolu Akande, the Senior Special Assistant to the Vice President on Media and Publicity, said on Sunday that the Federal Government had no intension to impose new taxes on Nigerians.
Akande said this when he appeared at the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Forum in Abuja.
He said that rather than new taxes the government was expanding the coverage area in its Value Added Tax (VAT) drive to generate more income.
“Essentially, we are not increasing VAT at this time, but what we are trying to do is to increase the coverage of VAT.
“So, for instance now, if VAT is only coverable for the 10 per cent that it should cover and you know the current rate is five per cent.
“We want to increase the coverage to 20 per cent because we believed that by just increasing the coverage, we are going to get in more revenue.
“So, I don’t think government is contemplating, at least not at the Federal government leave, presidency level, I do not think anybody is contemplating new taxes.
“But of course, we are looking at how our people don’t have to pay double taxes.
“I know that is one of the considerations before the Presidential Enabling Business Council which Mr President had asked the Vice President to chair.”
Akande, however, said that the council was looking at a whole lot of things happening in the business environment in order to encourage people to invest and to promote their businesses.
He said that government also was to ensure that those who wants to get all kinds of approval for business purposes could visit only a one stop shop.
According to him, we have installed one-stop-shop government policy approach.
“That is if you are a businessman and you have dealings with government.
“You do not have to go to Ministry of Finance today, Federal Inland Revenue Service or CAC tomorrow, among others you just have to go to one agent.
“Whatever you need from those agencies of government, the one stop shop will be the one that will do the running around.
“So, things like that are going on and we are actually trying to see that people do not suffer double taxation,’’ he said.
He assured Nigerians that government was doing its best to ensure that there was conducive environment for businesses to thrive. (NAN)