The Federal Government has put on hold the issuance of implementation guidelines for the newly enacted tax laws, citing uncertainty over the final version of the legislation, according to Taiwo Oyedele, Chairman of the Presidential Tax Reform Committee.
Oyedele disclosed that he had advised the Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS) and the Joint Revenue Board (JRB) to hold off, stressing that guidelines cannot be issued until there is clarity on the laws to be implemented.
He made the remarks in Lagos while responding to questions after delivering a keynote address on the 2026 Economic Outlook, organised by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN) with the theme, ‘ICAN@60: Accountability as the Bedrock for National Development,’ Daily Trust reports.
He said concerns over whether the documents currently in circulation represent the final version of the laws prompted him to instruct his team to buy a printed copy of the law from the government’s printer.
He said the feedback from his staff revealed that the National Assembly had taken custody of all printed copies of the tax laws and directed that they should not be sold or made available to the public until lawmakers conclude their review.
Efforts by Daily Trust to get a reaction from the Senate’s spokesman, Senator Yemi Adaramodu (APC, Ekiti South), were unsuccessful as he neither answered several phone calls nor responded to a WhatsApp message seeking his comments on the matter.
Also, calls to the mobile telephone line of the spokesperson of the House of Representatives, Akin Rotimi, did not go through last night.
While acknowledging that legislative review is a normal part of the lawmaking process, Oyedele noted that the restriction on access has reintroduced uncertainty into the tax reform process.
He said: “The Acts Authentication Act says whatever the government printer publishes is the evidence of the law that was passed.
“That government printer published something, which we said is the official version. Lawmakers said it is not what they passed. So, they said they would do their own gazettes.
“They set up their committee, they did their own review, they did their own gazettes. They sent me a copy, soft copy. But that’s not what the Acts Authentication Act says.
“So, I sent my staff, go to the government printer and go and buy. They went there, but as of last week, they said it’s not ready. That they should wait.
“So, I also told everybody, the NRS, JRB, you too wait, because we cannot issue guidelines.
“We are not 100 per cent certain that this is the final official position. I called my staff this (yesterday) morning, I said go back there, follow up every day, go, go there, don’t call them, go and sit down there.
“And I got feedback as I was here that says that… I don’t even know whether I should say this or not because I don’t know what the press will report. But in the interest of accountability and transparency, my staff told me that they said everything that they printed, the National Assembly collected from them and said they shouldn’t sell to anyone; that they want to complete their review. While that is good, it also creates uncertainty again.”
The National Revenue Service (Establishment) Act, the Joint Revenue Board of Nigeria (Establishment) Act, the Nigeria Tax Administration Act, and the Nigeria Tax Act — which took effect on January 1, had elicited criticisms following alleged alterations to the gazetted laws as against the versions passed by the National Assembly.
At the House of Representatives’ plenary in December, Abdussamad Dasuki (PDP, Sokoto) had raised a matter of privilege, alleging discrepancies between the tax laws passed by the National Assembly and the versions gazetted and made available to the public.
Rising under Order Six, Rule Two of the House Rules, Dasuki said his legislative privilege had been breached, insisting that the content of the gazetted tax laws did not reflect what members debated, voted on, and passed.
He said after spending the past three days to carefully review the gazetted copies alongside the Votes and Proceedings of the House as well as the harmonised version adopted by both chambers, he observed discrepancies.
The House later set up a seven-man committee to investigate the allegations and report within one week, which elapsed on December 25.
The legislature on January 3 released Certified True Copies (CTCs) of the approved versions of the tax laws as earlier passed by both chambers and transmitted for presidential assent.
A comparison of the Certified True Copies (CTCs) with the earlier “altered” gazetted versions showed that the discrepancies had been corrected, as the National Assembly endorsed the versions it passed and distanced itself from the controversial gazetted copies that had sparked public concern.
