Relevant Laws Back Our Collection of Stamp Duties, Says FIRS

Senate kicks against projected N500bn revenue for 2021 budget

The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) has justified its collection of stamp duties, saying there are relevant laws to back its action.

The Senate, however, objected to FIRS’s projected revenue of N500billion from the duties collection in 2021 budget.

Right of ownership of stamp duties collection between FIRS and NIPOST and the issue of two separate stamp duties came up during an interactive session between the Senate Joint Committee on Finance and National Planning and FIRS officials on the agency’s revenues projections for 2021 as contained in the 2021-2023 Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP).

Chairman of the Joint Committee, Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola, had asked the FIRS Executive Chairman, Muhamnad Nami, on right of collection of the duties and the N500billion projected as revenue for 2021 budget as against N1.5 trillion. Nami, in his response, said there are two types of stamp duties which are the electronically related and the adhesive ones stated in section 5(2) of the Stamp Duty Act.

Postage stamp, he added, is different from stamp duties payments, which he said, going by relevant laws, can be made to FIRS or IRS.

According to him, though loopholes in the Stamp Duties Act are urgently needed to be addressed, the right of collection for the electronic related ones has been legally given to FIRS by the National Assembly through the Finance Bill passed last year and assented to by President Muhammadu Buhari into an Act of Parliament.