Date: 2020-12-07

The Executive Chairman, Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Alhaji Mohammed Nami has put the performance of the agency from January to October, 2020, at N4.122 trillion, despite the Covid-19 challenges, the implementation of the Finance Act 2020 as well as concessions granted to taxpayers.

He said non-oil revenue collection performance in the same period stood at N2.8 trillion and oil revenue collection performance stood at N1.3 trillion.

Also, the chairman of Board of Trustees of Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) Alhaji Kashim Imam, has said about 226 tertiary institutions would access a total sum of N500 billion as education tax in 2021.

Nami, spoke at the TETfund/FIRS 2020 joint interactive forum in Ilorin. He also said the agency has collected the sum of N251 billion as at October this year for the TETfund.

Nami, who was represented by the agency's State Coordinator, Oyo-Ogun-Osun, Nureni Fasola, said FIRS raked in N214 billion for the Fund in 2019.

Also speaking, Imam, said a new target of N500 billion was set as education tax for the FIRS in 2021 considering the magnitude of challenges facing tertiary education in Nigeria.

He explained that beneficiaries of the affected tertiary institutions would be federal and state universities, polytechnics and colleges of education in the country.

Imam, who said the Fund was committed to impacting more, added that the BOT under him was determined to prove that public agency must, should work and must work to get results.

"The synergy between the FIRS and TETfund is vital to the transformation that is evident in our public tertiary institutions nationwide.

"This was achieved as a result of joint delivery of complementary services by providing amiable and lasting solutions to our beneficiaries.

"In addition, the successful strategic partnership over the years can be attributed to the strong, relentless commitment and cooperation by the leadership of both organisations and our zeal to improve Nigerian education nationwide", he said.

The chairman of the BOT also said the team at TETfund and FIRS would visit project sites in tertiary institutions in the state to see if the funds were judiciously utilised.

In his speech, the Executive Secretary, TETfund, Prof. Suleiman Bogoro, represented by the Director of Finance, Idris Seidu, said the Fund was striving to change the narratives by taking practical steps to put the nation on a revolutionary path of a knowledge based economy.

He said TETfund was committed to impacting the nation's tertiary institutions comprising of 226 federal and state universities, federal and state polytechnic and colleges of education for improved infrastructure components.