The Senate has described the claim by FCT Senator Ireti Kingibe that Nigerians would be made to surrender a quarter of their earnings as tax if the All Progressives Congress (APC) is returned to power in 2027 as misleading.
Senate spokesman Yemi Adaramodu, in an interview with him, said the tax law in question had been public for almost a year, having been passed by the National Assembly and signed into law by President Bola Tinubu.
He accused Kingibe of trying to rewrite the legislation for political gain.
Adaramodu, who chairs the Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs, insisted that the law as passed should be the only basis for judging it.
“Already, the tax law has been passed, and then it has become a public document.
“So, whatever is not in the tax law that is passed has never been included. Whatever is there is what has been passed by the National Assembly and assented to by the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“So, anybody bringing anything back from the tax reform or law is just becoming a revisionist. It’s only a revisionist that could still be talking about that. The tax law we are talking about was passed almost one year ago,” he stated.
The Senate spokesman also played down Kingibe’s status in the chamber, saying, “Point of correction, Senator Kingibe is not the presiding officer. She is just a Senator of the FCT.”
Adaramodu said the upper chamber would not respond to what he described as political comments but noted that any lawmaker with reservations about the law could table them formally.
“If any senator feels so nibbled by whatever law we have passed and has been assented to, he or she can come to the floor of the Senate and raise a motion or send a petition.
“We cannot be reacting to somebody passing a political comment. So, we cannot be reacting to that,” he said.
Kingibe, now seeking a return to the Senate on the platform of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), warned residents of the FCT in a widely shared video against voting for the APC.
In the clip, delivered in Pidgin English, she urged Nigerians to take their destiny in their hands.
“This is our country; we must claim it back. Nobody will do it for us. We are the ones to do it. As the country is not enjoyable for us, no one will change it except us. We must be the ones to stand up and say that enough is enough. We have had enough,” she said.
The senator further alleged that lawmakers had approved the 25 per cent tax, but its implementation was being delayed for fear of a backlash before the polls.
“Tax will soon be increased to 25 per cent of everything you earn. The money you currently have is not even enough for you. And what I am telling you, it has been passed. We have passed it in the National Assembly, but they are scared to implement it. As soon as you make the mistake, the amount of suffering you would endure, you haven’t even started to imagine it,” she said.
