FIRS Grows Q1 Revenue by 7% to N1.1trn

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) recorded an 7.3 percent year-on-year increase in revenue collection for the first quarter of 2020.

This occurred despite the impact of the coronavirus on the global economy, which heavily impacted business activities and the price of oil.

In a statement, FIRS spokesperson, Mr Abdullahi Ahmad, said a comparative analysis of the two periods showed levy collection in the first three months of the year was at N1.1 trillion (N1,123,377,654,135.14) compared with N1 trillion (N1,046,889,787,060.27) in the first quarter of 2019.

A breakdown further showed that Capital Gains Tax (CGT) increased by about 568 per cent from N96,408,740.90 in the first quarter of 2019 to N643,935,849.06 in the first quarter of 2020.

Mr Ahmad noted that the CGT gave the collection the necessary boost because current economic realities had pressured the agency’s revenue collection.

Company Income Tax (CIT) collection in the first quarter of 2020 rose by almost 135 percent to N95,733,194,644.91 from the corresponding figure of N40,696,980,658.52 recorded in the first quarter of 2019.

He also noted that reforms by the FIRS Chairman, Mr Muhammad Nami, less than four months of assuming office had helped with the blockage of leakages in the revenue flows into the country’s purse.

The tax body further disclosed that in Q1 2020, there was a record of a 522 percent increase in the collection from the National Information Technology Development Fund (NITDEF) to N690,532,855.85 against N111,037,797.16 in the same period in 2019.

Stamp Duty collection in the first quarter of 2020 stood at about N4,602,037,497.81, about 36 percent increase compared to the first quarter 2019 figure of N3,386,648,663.85.

In the education sector, the FIRS recorded an 81 percent increase in its collection of Education Tax, with N13,102,045,604.74, collected in the first quarter of 2020 compared to N7,229,644,397.68 in the corresponding period in 2019.

It was stated that both Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and non-import Value Added Tax (VAT) also increased by 11 percent in the first quarter of 2020 to N63,296,684,819.79 and N261,245,617,218.98 respectively from the first quarter 2019 figures of N57,008,866,617.53 and N236,030,481,054.83 correspondingly.

Also, in the period under review, the FIRS spokesperson said Gas Income Tax increased by 286 percent in Q1 2020, to N11,491,627,575.89, compared to N2,977,345,332.31 collected in the first quarter of 2019.

The agency’s spokesman noted that despite these records, happenings in the global economy had an adverse effect on oil prices as Petroleum Income Tax (PIT), Withholding Tax and Personal Income Tax all fell in the period under review.

Mr Ahmad noted that the drop is also as a result of the 2019 Finance Act into law and its coming to effect on February 1, 2020.

He noted that looking forward to the second quarter of the year, the agency was going to capitalise on technology in revenue collections.