The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) today disclosed that it generated a total of N2, 529,615,174,601.25 from various taxes from January to June this year.
A statement issued by the Director, Information of the Federal Ministry of Finance, Mr. Hassan Dodo, indicated that the amount represented 75 percent of the target set for the Service this year and an improvement over what was realized in the corresponding period of last year.
The statement confirmed that the N2,529,615,174,601.25 was higher by N746,107,323,247.26, or 42 percent than the total revenue the agency generated totalling N1,783,507,851,353.99 raked in the corresponding period in 2017.
A further analysis of the total amount showed that N1,168,627,365,306.67 was collected as Petroleum Profit Tax (PPT) as against N636,170,585,753.57, resulting in a positive variance of N532,456,779,553.10 generated in the first half of last year.
Also, the Company Income Tax (CIT) accruals for the first half of this year stood at total of N680,093,730,362.25, which was N128,151,996,465.68 more than the N551,941,733,896.57 in the previous year.
The Value Added Tax (VAT) yielded a total of N536,525,540,228.39 in the period under review, representing N68,841,756,240.06 higher than the N467,683,783,988.33 realized in the same period last year.
Others include The Education Tax which stood at N77,191,051,329.11 compared to the N58,868,372,910.79 in first half of last year, showing an increase of N18,322,678,418.32 while revenue from Stamp Duties was N7,492,592,658.35, which was N2,346,472,953.70 higher than the N5,146,119,704.65 raked in from the tax source in 2017.
The FIRS also collected N1,006,543,151.07 from Capital Gains Tax (CGT). The amount was N64,916,270.95 higher than the N 941,626,880.12 raked in the corresponding period of 2017 while the Service generated N9,249,618,573.91 from NITDEF, indicating an increase of N736,357,883.29 when compared to the N8,513,260,690.62 raked in the first half year 2017.
According to the ministry, the Consolidated Tax Revenue for the first six months this year was 49,428,732,991.50; representing N54,242,367,529.34 higher than the accruals of N4,813,634,537.84 raked in from January to June last year.
The FIRS expressed optimism that its effort would have a significant outcome, particularly in increasing non-oil tax revenue for the current year.
