African countries should curb illicit financial flows – Babatunde Fowler 

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Executive Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Babatunde Fowler, has encouraged African nations to find a way to stop illicit foreign flow, according to New Telegraph.

He made this call during the fourth International Conference of Tax in Africa in Kampala, the Ugandan capital.

The Details: He spoke alongside President Youweri Kaguta Museveni of Uganda, and Logan Wort, Executive Secretary of the African Tax Administration Forum (ATAF) at the international conference where they all sought different ways to boost revenue without relying on foreign aids, loans and handouts.

For the FIRS boss, who doubles as ATAF Chairman, governments of African countries should curb Illicit Foreign Flows (IFF) and tax rights of African consumers of goods produced in different parts of the world.

Fowler advocated that governments should play a regulatory role in monitoring online transactions as well as handling the welfare of tax officials which will enable them work assiduously without stealing the revenue of the state.

[READ MORE: FIRS announces N4 trillion revenue, as Fowler seeks law to jail Tax Evaders]

Giving an overview of his second tenure as Chairman, Fowler said, “ATAF Council consciously and consistently encourages active participation in standard-setting. ATAF regularly participates in OECD and technical committees’ work.   

 “We believe that this engagement not only ensures that solutions relevant to the continent are adopted, but that the subsequent delivery of tailor-made programmes to members help customise these.   

“At the end of 2019, ATAF has 24 active programmes across our membership. They report that these programmes led to the collection of over $300 million additional tax over the past two years, with additional assessments of over $1 billion.   

“The council will, therefore, continue to actively support the secretariat to acquire sufficient human and other resources to sustain these gains going forward,” he said.

In a recent Nairametrics article, Fowler divulged that Nigeria was losing $15 billion to tax evasion. He was worried that several people are successfully evading tax. He also promised to respond to the global issues of international tax avoidance, tax evasion, illicit financial flows, money laundering and other harmful tax practices, using advanced technology.