Missing $3.3 Billion: Nigerian Senate Queries CBN Over Unremitted Taxes

The Senate Committee on Public Account has sought for an in-depth probe into how $3.3 billion was missing from foreign taxes collected by the Federal Inland Revenue Services and Central Bank of Nigeria in 2015.

Naija News Understands that the Federal Inland Revenue Service recorded a total of 21.3 billion dollars for the taxes collected in 2015 but the CBN only remitted $18 billion to the coffer of the federation account.

The Chairman of the Senate Committee, Senator Mathew Uroghide who revealed this while briefing newsmen after the closed-door meeting with the Deputy Governor of the CBN, Edward Adamu said that the CBN must defend how $3.3billion got missing.

However, the representative of the apex bank while defending the allegation on the missing $3.3 billion explained that the differences in the figures were due to the changes in the exchange rate.

“The $3.3 billion is neither missing nor unremitted, but the difference is due to variations of the exchange rate during time,” he explained.But the committee disputed this.

The chairman of the committee,, mandated the bank to reappear before the panel next Monday with documents detailing the said variations in the exchange rate. He also revealed that most of the security agencies have no audited accounts.

According to him, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Police and Nigerian Army among other security agencies have no audited accounts.