Falana Urges Federal Govt To Address Controversies On New Tax Laws

The federal government has been advised to address the controversies surrounding the legitimacy of the new tax laws before implementing them.

Human rights lawyer, Mr Femi Falana (SAN), who gave the advice in a chat with journalists on Wednesday at his Ilawe Ekiti country home, headquarters of Ekiti Southwest local government area of Ekiti State, said there is a need for Nigerians to have access to the clean copies of the tax laws before they take effect.

Falana also said that governments at all levels must always be prepared to justify the payment of taxes by Nigerians, as taxes are being imposed on them.

Recall there were allegations that specific provisions had been smuggled into the tax bill passed by the National Assembly, thus making the tax law signed by President Bola Tinubu on June 26, 2025 and billed to be effective from January 1, 2026, different from the Bill passed.

He posited that the government should use the last few days of 2025 to address the issue and produce clean copies of the new tax laws before January 1, 2026.

He said that the government considered the tax laws as part of its economic reform programme, hence the need for Nigerians to be made familiar with the provisions of the Tax Laws.

The senior advocate said, “If that was not done, the government will put itself into trouble deciding to implement the laws.

There are interest groups that are ready to challenge the legitimacy of the laws”.

“The laws cannot take effect until the controversies surrounding the legitimacy of the provisions are addressed.

“There are questions about the authentic tax laws – so which laws are we talking about? Until we have clean copies of the tax laws, it is not yet possible to speak of the commencement date.

“There is a serious allegation that some items were smuggled into the new tax laws. It has been misrepresented as a forgery by some. Whichever way you look at it, the National Assembly has itself to blame.

“In this age and time, it is unacceptable that we cannot access bills passed by the National Assembly and signed into law by the President. Why are the bills not on the website of the National Assembly?

“If you want to run a transparent government, the proceedings of the National Assembly, laws passed by the National Assembly and signed by the President, should be accessible to all, but that is not the position now.

“It would have been easier for Nigerians to compare the harmonised bills passed by the National Assembly and the bills that were signed into law by the president.  These allegations of forgery are only understood by the few members of the National Assembly. As usual, Nigerians are not aware of the state of the law”.

While maintaining that the federal, state and local governments must use taxes imposed to better the lot of Nigerians, Falana said, “The government must be prepared to use the taxes to fight poverty, employment, insecurity and infrastructural decay that have arrested the development of the economy.