The Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister for Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), has unveiled the federal government programme on tax amnesty for defaulters who voluntarily declare their foreign assets.
The minister at the unveiling ceremony for the programme tagged: Voluntary Offshore Assets Regularisation Scheme (VOARS) on Tuesday, announced that the scheme was initiated by Swiss Consortium to facilitate regularization of offshore assets owned by Nigerians.
“It is to bring to the attention of Nigerians with assets offshore that have not been compliant in terms of tax payment and that has stored their assets outside to encourage them to bring back their assets into Nigeria for the purpose of allowing them to be regularized and for the purpose of allowing them to invest in infrastructure in Nigeria,” he said.
Malami said the scheme is in furtherance of the Executive Order 8 signed by President Muhammadu Buhari in 2018, adding that the window is for a 12-month period, which would involve a deduction of 35 percent on the voluntarily declared assets, while two and a half percent will be charged as administrative fees for purpose of assessing the funds, and the remaining 63 percent will be registered in the system and become taxable in Nigeria.
Explaining the benefits of the scheme to the country, Malami said it will increase Nigeria’s tax base, bridge the infrastructure deficit and invite Foreign Direct Investment for the development of infrastructure in Nigeria.
Also speaking, the Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed said the programme is part of the efforts to increase the revenue like the Voluntary Assets and Income Declaration Scheme (VAIDS), which has enabled the government increase taxpayers from 14 million to 19 million with a total of N30bn realized during one-year grace of between July 1, 2017, and June 30, 2018.
