The Federal Government, through the Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms, says they are working to reduce the number of taxes from the current 62 to a maximum of 9 in the country.

Chairman of the committee, Taiwo Oyedele revealed this at the 53rd annual conference of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria in Abuja.

Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms, chairman said the step had become imperative, as the current multiplicity of taxes had made tax administration cumbersome and ineffective.

Oyedele said: “At the federal level. The list is somewhere close to 16 officially at the state level 25 Local Government 21 But this is just the beginning of the story. The story is incomplete. Until you add the over 108 informal taxes collected all over the place, sometimes by non-state actors that have been empowered, either passively or actively by the government.

“In fact, we have bicycle tax, and wheelbarrow tax in Nigeria. I think if you’re looking for the definition of wickedness, it will be to find a man who is struggling to make ends meet pushing their wheelbarrow in the sun and say, you have not paid your tax.

“What I want and hope to achieve is the reduction of the number of taxes to less than 10, yes, we want a single digit, and we want to cut down revenue collection agencies to one for each tier of government. With this, the federal government has one revenue collection agency, the same for state and local governments. So that they can focus on their primary mandate of making life easier for citizens.”

On the issue of poverty Oyedele highlighted a range of pressing issues that Nigeria must confront, such as poverty, meagre revenue, surging debt among others.

“We have widespread poverty, government’s revenue is low and as a consequence, public debt is high. And the debt service to revenue ratio is one of the highest we’ve seen anywhere in the world. Investment is declining and you cannot have economic growth without investments.

“Whether they are domestic or international, we’re not attracting foreign investment, and we’re not mobilizing domestic investment enough. Many of the existing investors are leaving and those who are left are asking questions; can we continue?

“So, these are fundamental issues we must address our people also leaving the country as a percentage of the population not too far. From my view is that even if it’s only 1 per cent, to the extent that they are leaving because they feel frustrated, then we should be concerned”.