By Babajide Okeowo
Despite the COVID-19 challenges, Financial Act 2019 incentives, and palliatives concessions, the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) has generated N4.122 trillion from January to October 2020. This is against the N5tr the service generated in the whole of 2019.
FIRS added that its non-oil revenue collection performance in the same period stood at N2.8 trillion and oil revenue collection performance stood at N1.3 trillion.
This was disclosed by FIRS Executive Chairman, Mohammad Nami in Ilorin, Kwara state capital at the 2020 joint interactive session of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETfund)/FIRS.
Nami also disclosed that the service collected the sum of N251billion as at October this year for the TETFund which is higher than the N214 billion the service generated for the Fund in 2019.
Nami was represented at the session by the agency’s director, state coordinator of Oyo, Ogun and Osun, Nureni Fasola.
Also speaking, the Chairman Board Of Trustees Of The Fund, Kashim Imam revealed that 226 tertiary institutions in the country would access N500 billion from TETfund in 2021.
He added TETfund set that target of N500 billion as education tax for the FIRS in 2021 “considering the magnitude of challenges facing tertiary education in Nigeria.”
Imam, who said that the Fund was committed to impact more, added that the BoT under him was determined to prove that “public agencies must, should work and must work to get results.
“The synergy between the FIRS and TETfund is vital to the transformation that is evident in our public tertiary institutions nationwide. This was achieved as a result of joint delivery of complementary services by providing amicable and lasting solutions to our beneficiaries. In addition, the successful strategic partnership over the years can be attributed to the strong, relentless commitment and cooperation by the leadership of both organizations and our zeal to improve Nigerian education nationwide” he said.
The chairman of the BoT also said that the team of the TETfund and FIRS would visit project sites in tertiary institutions in the state to see if the funds were judiciously utilized.
Earlier, Executive Secretary of TETfund, Prof Suleiman Bogoro, represented by Director of Finance Idris Saidu said that the fund was “striving to change the narratives by taking practical steps to put the nation on a revolutionary path of a knowledge-based economy.”
Recall that the TETfund was set up to positively impact the nation’s tertiary institutions comprising of 226 federal and state universities, federal and state polytechnic and Colleges of Education for improved infrastructure components.
