The federal government has given ship owners operating on Nigerian waterways a three-month window to clear their ten years outstanding tax bill running into millions of United States dollars.
This was disclosed by the Special Adviser to the President on Revenue, Dr Zachaeus Adedeji, while briefing State House correspondents after a meeting between President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and representatives of the ship owners.
He said the federal government has given the vessel owners a window of three months to pay the taxes and balance their accounts.
“We’ve now resolved within ourselves to settle this issue as quickly as possible, just to make sure that we don’t affect the flow of the products in and outside the country.
“We also made it clear that Nigeria will not accept any blackmail by defaulters, who are not complying with our laws. We have laws and they must be respected and obeyed.
“However, we will not detain or arrest any defaulting ship or vessel because this is what is causing panic. We’ve sent them a demand notice and then they’ve also come and the agreement is that we should give them time. So we’ve agreed to set up a technical committee to resolve these issues,” he said.
He said that an interactive session was held with the stakeholders including oil and gas regulators, Nigeria National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited, Federal Inland Revenue Service and the Presidency.
“There was demand notice, which was issued to the vessel owners or chatters, as it were, which is in accordance with the Nigerian tax law, that they should remit the tax deal to them, for the last ten years and that there were concerns about the timing of compliance or fear of enforcement.
“The technical committee will comprise of the regulator, which is NUPRC, NMDRA, NNPC, FIRS, and the Presidency, in the Office of Chief of Staff, SA Energy and SA Revenue and the Secretariat is at the Federal Inland Revenue,” he said.
He said the technical committee would look at the concerns and reconcile the backlog of taxes and set a process that would ensure compliance going forward.
He said Nigeria is open for business and remains business friendly as could be seen from the actions and pronouncements of the President.
“We are open, but that is not to say that anybody will take advantage of the country. We have the law and the law must be respected,” he said.
