Northern region not against tax reform – Bwala

The Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Policy Communication, Daniel Bwala, has said that the only people against the Tax Reform Bills are the governors.

Bwala said this while countering the notion that the northern region is against the bills.

Newspot reported that in the early stage of the bills, a joint meeting of the Northern Governors Forum and the Northern Traditional Rulers Council had rejected the Tax Reform Bill forwarded to the National Assembly by President Bola Tinubu.

Tinubu on October 3, 2024, forwarded a tax reform bill to the Senate and House of Representatives for approval.

Part of the bill provides reforms in the sector, including changing the name of the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, to the Nigeria Revenue Service, NRS.

Advertisement

”The tax reform bills have come to stay, and they will be passed. Let us forget that it is the North vs. the South; it is the governors who are going to be impacted,” Bwala said during an interview on Channels Television.

“It is the governors from states where their income will reduce if the derivation is applied. These set of governors are in the majority of the states and not limited to the North.

“Maybe the governors from the north have decided to be vocal about it.

“But in the midst of this cacophony of positions between the governors and the federal government remember, even the case of Local Government autonomy it wasn’t a case of region it was still the governors because local government autonomy from the beginning was considered an initiative that would weaken their powers…”