Remit tax on Remita to FG, Reps ask GTB

The House of Representatives Public Accounts Committee has directed Guaranty Trust Bank to calculate and remit the Value Added Tax on the commission received from Remita transactions between 2015 and 2022 to the Federal Government.

Remita is a financial solution gateway technology used by the Federal Government for the collection of revenue for Ministries, Departments, and Agencies into the Treasury Single Account.

The committee, chaired by Bamidele Salam, who represents Ede South/Ede North/Ejigbo/Egbedore Federal Constituency in Osun State, issued the directive on Thursday during an ongoing investigation into alleged revenue leakages through the Remita platform.

The investigation is also examining instances of non-compliance with standard operating procedures and other related service agreements.

The committee raised concerns about the non-remittance of VAT during the initial phase of the Remita transactions.

GTB’s Executive Director, Mr Ahmed Liman, admitted that the bank had not remitted the VAT for eight years.

“We believe that Remita is responsible for distributing the commission fees between the payment-receiving parties. In our understanding, we assumed Remita had done the necessary remittance before sharing the fees.”

Mr Liman also addressed the collection of fees during the early phase of Remita transactions, noting that the bank charges 0.75 per cent from payers using the Remita platform. He added that the bank received N254.49m from the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation through Remita in 2018.

The committee subsequently ordered GTB to calculate and remit the VAT on commission fees received through the platform from 2015 to 2022 into the Federal Government recovery accounts domiciled with the Central Bank of Nigeria.

Representatives from other banks, including Keystone, Zenith Bank, Sterling Bank, Polaris Bank, FCMB, Ecobank, and Wema, also appeared before the committee on the same matter.

The committee referred these banks to its reconciliation sub-committee to resolve discrepancies in their submissions. They are expected to reconcile the issues and will be given a new date to reappear before the committee.