Less than three months after President Bola Ahmed Tinubu took office, the Youth Party (YP) has repeatedly emphasized the necessity for the federal and sub-national governments to show restraint, get rid of waste, and bring criminal charges against those who had plundered Nigeria’s commonwealth.
Ayodele Adio, the national publicity secretary for YP, brought up the matter during a courtesy visit to The Guardian and added that an increase in the national minimum wage was urgently required to help the underprivileged deal with the consequences of the elimination of gasoline subsidies.
Adio, who was accompanied by the party’s head of digital media, Adeogun Oluwadamilola, urged the government to subsidize public transportation in order to lessen the policy’s negative effects on low-income earners and the vulnerable. Adio noted that this could be accomplished by allowing public transportation providers to continue purchasing fuel at a discounted rate, either through a weekly voucher system or exemption from certain statutory fees, so long as they maintain reasonable transportation costs.
He contends that the government should give its neglected Autogas Policy top priority in order to hasten the switch to Compressed Natural Gas (CNG). He mentioned that CNG is an affordable, cleaner fuel, and that some businesses were already effectively using it to power their fleets.
To make this easier, he said, the government should create a legal framework that supports gas growth, subsidizes the cost of converting 10,000 gasoline or diesel engines to compressed natural gas, and ensures that CNG is accessible at filling stations.
The party emphasized the necessity of increasing the nation’s tax base while lowering tax rates to draw in investments and promote tax compliance.
The strategy put forth by our party, according to Adio, “outlines strategies that could raise $US30 billion in three years by improving our tax and incentive policies and effectively utilizing Nigeria’s existing assets.”
The increase in revenue generation, partial divestment of Federal Government equity in particular companies, replacement of the general gasoline subsidy with targeted public transportation and LNG subsidy, cessation of the electricity subsidy, reduction of the cost of governance, and promotion of public trust and accountability are all components of YP’s plan to solve Nigeria’s revenue problems, he continued.
According to Adio, high corporate tax rates kill businesses and deter foreign direct investments (FDI), as evidenced by the following: “Our consolidated corporate tax is 34.5 percent: Companies Income Tax, 30%; Education Tax, 2%; Employees Compensation Fund, 1%; Industrial Training Fund, 1%; Compensation Act and Police Trust Levy, 0.5 percent.”We acknowledge the tax exemption and incentives granted to small and medium scale businesses under the Finance Act 2019 to 0% and 20% tax rates, respectively. The global average for company income tax is 23.03 percent.”
Adio emphasized the need to reduce corporate tax for both large and medium scale business to 22.5 per cent in order to encourage more businesses, create employment opportunities, and increase revenue generation through improved tax compliance. He claimed that the 35 per cent consolidated rate for large companies was too high and creates collection issues, including tax evasion and avoidance.
“It is necessary to keep the minimum tax rate for small firms at 5%. The incentive for tax evasion and avoidance would be lessened with a lower corporate income tax, and businesses would be dissuaded from maintaining two accounting books. Additionally, this ought to draw additional FDI into the country.
“Most of our federal initiatives would eventually flow down to the states and benefit from state revenue. However, states must also produce enough to increase their own internal revenue.
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