Senate Committee on Finance is set to commence the investigation of all revenue generating Ministries, Departments and Agencies(MDAs) to discover their compliance with relevant laws on Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) and ensure more revenue accrues to the Consolidated Revenue Fund.
Senator Solomon Adeola, who disclosed this during the 2021 Budget Defence of Federal Inland Revenue Service(FIRS) explained that the investigation would have commenced yesterday but was deferred to today following the death of a House of Representatives member and the suspension of legislative activities by the senate.
The chairman stated that the era of reliance on revenues from crude oil sale and a few other sources to finance government recurrent and capital expenditures was no longer sustainable.
“There is no doubt that many MDAs are in default in their remittances of revenue generated during their operation as stipulated by the Fiscal Responsibility Act 2007 as well as the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria. In view of the dire straits that Nigeria is in now, this cannot be allowed to continue and the investigation is to get to the bottom of the non-compliance by MDAs.”
Adeola said the investigation would also include remittances or otherwise of the one per cent stamp duties accruing from all awarded contracts by MDAs which were not remitted to FIRS stressing that this includes all government agencies beyond the over 460 revenue generating MDAs.
The investigation is to cover the period between 2014 till date and submissions already made by MDAs are to be corroborated by the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF) as well as the records with the Fiscal Responsibility Commission who are part of the technical team of the senate investigation.
