Indiscriminate waivers: NASS sets up panel to probe N4trn revenue shortfall

The National Assembly Joint Committee on Finance has constituted a special committee to probe a shortfall of over N4 trillion revenue due to indiscriminate waivers by agencies of government.

The decision to set up a panel to probe the shortfall followed a motion moved by Senator Adamu Aliero during the hearing to probe the revenue profiles of Ministries, Departments, and Agencies, MDAs, and Government-Owned Enterprises, GOEs, ahead of the 2025 budget.

The hearing was to enable the Senate and House of Representatives committees to develop accurate and realistic revenue projections for 2025.

This joint committee is co-chaired by Senator Sani Musa and James Faleke.

Moving the motion, Aliero said, “Due to the issue of waiver, there is a serious shortfall between what is supposed to be collected as revenue and what is actually collected.

“From our record, over N5.9 trillion was supposed to be the consolidated revenue fund of the federation. But we only have N1.9 trillion. We need to set up a special committee that will investigate this serious anomaly.

“We cannot continue to allow revenue agencies to be spending money without the National Assembly. If someone is given a waiver, we have to find out who gave that waiver.

“A shortfall of over N4 trillion is not a small amount. We found out that over N 4.9 trillion has not been remitted. We should set up an investigative committee that would investigate all the money that has not been remitted.”