By Kayode Emola
As we move closer to 2026, one thing that will be on the minds of many Nigerians is the new tax regime of President Tinubu coming into effect on 1st January 2026. Many people are wondering how this is going to affect their personal finances; is the government going to come into their bank accounts to seize their hard-earned money, especially if they cannot prove the source?
Some are wondering, haven’t we already been taxed enough? What else are they looking for that they haven’t already got? I have deliberately stayed away from this topic for some time, but I believe it is prudent to shed some light on what is really happening, especially as its implementation is imminent.
Tinubu has travelled to many countries and has seen how many developed economies work. Most countries survive mainly on taxation, but taxes without accountability would not bring the desired change or development in the country. So, I believe that the new tax regime brings a tangible positive impact on the people of the country, as claimed by the government.
Let’s even ask ourselves what the term tax refers to. Tax is a mandatory financial charge imposed by the government of a country on individuals’ income, companies’ profits, or the cost of goods and services.
If tax is the mandatory financial charge on an individual’s income or a company’s profit, etc, how come the Nigerian government is just waking up to realise that Nigerians are not properly taxed? First, many Nigerians are being taxed through their employment, and many big businesses are also being taxed. The only problem with Nigeria is that we do things haphazardly, which makes for ineffective results.
Tinubu’s proposed tax regime is going to experience a lot of hiccups and not necessarily achieve the desired results it was intended to achieve. Not because the government does not have genuine intentions but because the Nigerian government is working in reverse when it comes to taxation.
In many progressive countries, there is less bureaucracy in setting up a company. Once your company is set up, you are automatically given a unique tax reference number, which you can use to open a bank account and start transactions. When we are talking about progressive countries, I don’t mean the likes of the USA, Canada, UK, Norway etc. I am talking about countries in Africa, like Rwanda, where it takes just about 6 hours to open a company and get set up for business.
In fact, you can open a company on your way to Rwanda, and your company will be ready to go before you get there. This little bottleneck makes it easier to get set up in a place like Rwanda and many other progressive countries compared to a country like Nigeria, where it takes forever to set up a company. Even after opening your company in Nigeria, it could take you forever to get set up for banking transactions, let alone getting your business.
The bottom line here is that it is not that Nigerians don’t want to pay tax but the bureaucracy in setting up a business makes it difficult to get set up and registered for tax purposes. For a country that has less people in paid employment, the government would need to make it easier for people to set up a company so that people can actually run their business through a limited company for proper accountability.
Secondly, over 70 percent of Nigerians live in abject poverty, so when the government is talking about taxing the people, it feels more like asking the people to make straws with their hands. How can you tax someone who literally don’t have anything to give? The majority of the people live on less than $2/day, and most of them don’t even have a bank account. How then does the government expect to tax them?
In 2021, the government imposed various forms of charges on personal and business bank accounts. The aim was to generate revenue for the government, and it was hailed as a panacea for development as the government had hoped to raise a lot of revenue this way. Fast forward 5 years, and the government is planning to abolish it and introduce direct taxation instead, thinking it can raise more money.
The truth is that most developed countries like Britain, which raises over 70 percent of its income through taxation, do so through the pay-as-you-earn (PAYE) system. This is the most effective way to collect taxes for the state and generate the needed revenue for development. In the case of Nigeria, many people are not in paid employment; therefore, I don’t think the government will generate as much as it has hoped for.
This means that the newly introduced tax regime is just another government exercise and whether it succeed or fails remains to be seen, depending on how it is implemented. How can the pepper seller or the groundnut seller in the market pay their tax. These small traders are merely survivors who live on their daily income and have nothing left for their day-to-day essentials.
For those who are confused about the Nigeria tax reform, I will advise them to get for themselves the gazetted copy through this link C:\Users\Computer Section\Deskt. I believe most of the questions regarding the Nigeria Tax Act 2025 can be found here.
As we move forward to January 2026, I will use this opportunity to wish our people a happy new year and hope that the Tinubu tax regime makes their lives better. I sincerely hope that the government is not, in all sincerity, trying to introduce stealth taxes on our already impoverished people.
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