Economy
New Excise Bill Not Good for Tinubu’s Fiscal Reform Agenda—OPS
By Aduragbemi Omiyale
The positive results being envisaged by President Bola Tinubu through his fiscal reform agenda could be undermined by the proposed amendment to the Customs, Excise and Tariff Bill.
This is the view of the Organized Private Sector (OPS) of Nigeria, comprising the Nigerian Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA), the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN), the Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA), National Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (NASME) and the National Association of Small Scale Industrialists (NASSI).
The group argued that the current draft of the bill does not align with the federal government’s fiscal reform direction because it contains several legal and administrative gaps.
As a result, the organisation advised the National Assembly to withdraw it in order not to slowdown the current economic progress.
In a paper presented on Thursday during a public hearing on the proposed amendment bill, which recently passed its second reading in the parliament, OPS submitted that policies must be holistic, harmonised, and context-appropriate, ensuring that they improve health outcomes without undermining jobs, investment, affordability, or industrial stability.
It maintained that Nigeria’s excise framework is increasingly fragmented, as new levies are introduced without coordinated assessment of their combined effects on production, investment, backward integration, employment, exports, and inflation, which may result in unintended consequences negating President Tinubu’s administration’s key economic reforms without delivering measurable public health gains.
The group further noted that a steep excise increase or introduction of a levy would impose substantial economic costs on businesses and consumers without delivering measurable public health gains. The group stated that the proposed excise amendment introduces mathematical, legal, and administrative contradictions, worsens Nigeria’s already fragmented fiscal environment, and directly conflicts with national industrialisation priorities, including the Nigeria Sugar Master Plan.
OPS also warned that the amendment could weaken the beverage value chain, one of the country’s most significant contributors to non-oil revenue and a major employer. Industry experts added that the levy would push up operating costs, reduce capacity utilisation, and raise consumer prices at a time when households and small businesses are already under pressure, with many slipping deeper into poverty. This, in turn, could reduce VAT and CIT collections, placing additional strain on medium-term FAAC revenues.
“Nigeria’s non-alcoholic drinks sector is a critical economic stabiliser, supporting 1.5 million jobs, driving backward integration under the NSMP II, and contributing 40 – 45 per cent of gross revenues as taxes and yet already operating under severe macroeconomic strain and thin margins,” said OPS.
According to the body, given that the beverage industry falls among the non-oil revenue contributors, passing the bill into law could undermine the administration’s ease of doing business objectives at such a sensitive economic period.
The group faulted the National Assembly for advancing the bills without coordination with the Ministry of Finance, the Presidential Fiscal Policy & Tax Reform Committee, FAAC, and other responsible institutions. It noted that the bill contradicts the President’s emphasis on stability, predictability, simplicity, and non-disruptive tax reform.
It further stressed that global and domestic evidence confirm that steep or ambiguous SSB taxes in low-income economies lead to job losses, contraction of MSMEs, reduced government revenue, and no measurable health benefits, while widening inequality and accelerating the growth of the informal market.
“The amendment bill contains internal contradictions (20 per cent levy per litre of retail price) that are impossible to implement consistently. Over-taxation may shrink the formal sector, reduce VAT and CIT collections and shift consumers to informal markets. The bill may cut medium-term FAAC distributions and weaken state-level revenue stability,” OPS added.
The association added that it remains open to continued engagement with lawmakers, fiscal agencies, and civil society groups to ensure that any revision to the excise regime supports investment, jobs, and long-term revenue stability.
By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigeria’s headline inflation rate moderated marginally by 0.04 per cent to 15.06 per cent in February 2026 from 15.10 per cent in January 2026.
This information was contained in the latest data of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Monday.
It was revealed that the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures changes in the average price level of goods and services, rose to 130.0 in February from 127.4 in the preceding month, representing a 2.6-point increase.
On a month-on-month basis, however, inflationary pressures accelerated.
The headline inflation rate stood at 2.01 per cent in February 2026, marking a sharp increase of 4.89 percentage points compared to the -2.88 per cent recorded in January 2026.
At 15.06 per cent, the print is higher than analysts’ expectations. Coronation Research projected over the weekend that the inflation rate for the month under review would moderate by 0.98 per cent to 14.12 per cent.
“Our projection is supported by favourable base effects, easing food price pressures, and slight appreciation of the Naira,” a part of the report said.
The organisation revealed that ongoing government interventions in the agricultural sector to improve food supply conditions were beginning to ease pressures within the food component of the consumer basket.
It further stated that “appreciation of the Naira to N1,363.40/1$ from N1,386.55/1$ in January is expected to reduce the cost of imported food items.”
However, it stressed that the ongoing US/Israel-Iran war was capable of reversing the deflationary trends because of the rising global energy prices.
The marginal moderation further lends credence to the 50-basis-point cut in interest rate at the 304th Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to 26.50 per cent from 27 per cent.
By Adedapo Adesanya
The President of the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), Mr George Elombi, said the lender’s gamble on the soon-to-be expanded 650,000-barrel-per-day Dangote Refinery has paid off amid rising energy needs following the United States and Israel’s war on Iran.
Speaking recently on the sidelines of last Monday’s formal signing event to host the bank’s Intra-African Trade Fair 2027 in Lagos, a continental commerce event designed to boost trade across Africa, Mr Elombi said the fears that its involvement in the $20 billion infrastructure “could break Afreximbank” have proven to be a win for the company and the continent.
The $20 billion Dangote Refinery, which was largely financed by Afreximbank, has been described as a transformative project for Nigeria’s energy landscape. It has disrupted local markets as well as foreign markets.
In October 2025, Mr Elombi revealed in Cairo that Mr Aliko Dangote was seeking an additional $5 billion to expand his refinery in Lagos. This came after Afreximbank announced a $1.35 billion facility for Dangote Industries Limited as part of a $4 billion syndicated financing deal to refinance the construction of the complex, the largest single-train refinery in the world, in August. The bank contributed the largest share.
Mr Elombi, who took over the presidency of the lender in October, stated at the time that Mr Aliko Dangote had personally disclosed the plan earlier and assured the bank would explore all possible financing options.
In his latest comment regarding the relationship, he said, “We looked around, and we said, if we didn’t do it, then who else was going to come and take the risk later. Still, the risk is a gamble, but on this occasion we were lucky because it turned out to be a very positive gamble.”
“You gamble on someone like Mr Aliko Dangote, every type of gamble will be on the winning side. So we went along with the gamble, and you can see what the impact is; it is that he can now refine domestically and sell at the domestic rate. We can now use Dangote as an instrument for dealing with our refined product challenges across the Gulf of Guinea and further in some countries,” he added.
He described the refinery as “a development instrument” for African countries in light of the disruptions, saying “he (Dangote) has to use it for that purpose and we will be using it all the way down the Atlantic Coast, Namibia, Botswana, where we intend to put storage facilities so that when crises happens like this, long as is further away from the African coast.”
By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigeria’s crude production dropped 145,000 barrels per day in February 2026, reversing the small gains made in January 2026.
The country averaged 1.314 million barrels of crude per day, a 9.94 per cent slide from the 1.459 million barrels of crude per day averaged in January 2026, according to data published in the March 2026 issue of the OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report (MOMR).
The main contributor to the decrease was the ongoing turnaround maintenance of the Bonga field, the country’s largest single producing accumulation. The TAM runs from February 1 to March 18, 2026.
February 2026 data from the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) had not been released as of March 13, 2026, so it’s unclear what the volume of condensate produced in the month was since OPEC doesn’t publish condensate volumes produced by its members.
However, the crude oil figures published in the MOMR for every country are cleared with the regulatory agencies of those countries, so the 1.314 million barrels of crude per day figure is expected to be confirmed when NUPRC data for February 2026 is published on its website.
Despite the plunge, Nigeria remained Africa’s largest crude oil producer in the month, with second-place Libya also dropping from 1. 378 million barrels of crude per day in January to 1 287 million barrels of crude per day in February 2026.
The drop in production may affect Nigeria’s gains from the expected oil windfall, as skyrocketing oil prices are heightened by Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
The closure of the Strait, which connects the Gulf to the world market, has triggered the biggest oil supply disruption in history. The narrow waterway is a critical energy choke point that typically carries roughly 20 per cent of the world’s oil.
The international benchmark Brent crude futures traded 1.9 per cent higher at $105.00 per barrel.
The Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) spearheaded more than 30 countries to release 400 million barrels of stockpiled oil to address the supply disruption. Asian nations will start releasing emergency oil supplies immediately, while countries in the Americas and Europe will start releasing their stockpiles by the end of March.
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