{"id":30075,"date":"2020-09-18T16:17:30","date_gmt":"2020-09-18T16:17:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/nigeria\/?p=30075"},"modified":"2020-09-18T16:17:30","modified_gmt":"2020-09-18T16:17:30","slug":"why-fg-ordered-nigerians-to-submit-self-certification-forms-tax-expert-oyedele","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/why-fg-ordered-nigerians-to-submit-self-certification-forms-tax-expert-oyedele","title":{"rendered":"Why FG ordered Nigerians to submit Self-Certification Forms \u2013 Tax expert, Oyedele"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa Press-Nigeria:<\/p>\n

Taiwo Oyedele, Head of Tax and Corporate Advisory Services at PwC Nigeria, has explained the federal government\u2019s directive to Nigerians on Self-Certification Forms.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, the President Muhammadu Buhari administration directed all account holders in banks, insurance companies and other financial institutions to obtain, complete and submit the forms.<\/p>\n

The government noted that this would enable institutions to do due diligence procedures in line with the Income Tax Regulations 2019.<\/p>\n

Consequences include monetary penalty or inability to operate the account.<\/p>\n

In his explanation, Oyedele said the development is in connection with the commencement of automatic exchange of taxpayers information between Nigeria and other countries.<\/p>\n

He noted that the information required is to enable reporting financial institutions to determine the tax residency of their customers to know which countries to share your information with.<\/p>\n

In the case of corporate accounts, the exercise is required to determine the beneficial ownership and control also for reporting purposes, Oyedele tweeted.<\/p>\n

Observing that many people are angry, he argued that the exchange of information initiative will help the government obtain data from other countries regarding Nigerian residents\u2019 finances.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn exchange, Nigerian government must provide information about persons in Nigeria who are tax residents in other jurisdictions to the relevant countries. The FG could have done a better job of simplifying the process and communicating more effectively.<\/p>\n

\u201cA simple analogy is like asking everyone to make a self declaration so that the government can determine how many Nigerians have attended a foreign university onsite when a simple information filtering will show that we need not bother 99% of Nigerians about it.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe mere fact that the government is asking Nigerians to provide this declaration is a reflection that the country poorly handles data management. The same reason why many countries were able to easily administer palliatives to their citizens during this pandemic and we couldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour bank has an interest in getting this right so you can wait until they reach out to you. Banks have done a similar thing before under the US FATCA and they didn\u2019t ask everyone to make a declaration. I am hopeful that banks will be able to do the same this time around\u201d, he added.<\/p>\n