Charles Nwaoguji
The Founder/President of International Centre for Tax Research and Development (ICTRD), Mrs. Morenike Babington-Ashaye, has said described the Executive Order 007 as a constitution violation.
In an interview with Daily Sun recently, Babington-Ashaye said the Executive Order 007 should be modified, stressing that road infrastructure is the business of the Government of the Federation and not the Federal Government. She stated that the President needs to get the permission of state governors to release their share of Companies Income Tax (CIT) to pay beneficiaries of the Road Infrastructure and Refurbishment Scheme. State governments, according to her, must confirm work done in their states before their share of CIT is released to any participant.
She noted that local governments’ share of CIT should remain intact and must be paid to them because there are no federal roads passing through their communities.
“The Federal Government and state governments must state in their budgets the amount of tax credit that will be accommodated each year, and list out the roads that are qualified, and to whom contracts have been awarded and the cost of the road. The international rate for constructing road projects should be used as benchmark and any participant who cannot accept the benchmark should withdraw,” she said.
She pointed that the federal and state governments must defend the Road Infrastructure and Refurbishment Scheme before the National Assembly and State House of Assembly respectively as governments are not permitted by the Constitution to act outside the budget.
She said that there is no need for Road Infrastructure and Refurbishment Scheme Committee. The National Sovereign Investment Fund (NSIF) Act has provided for the Nigeria Infrastructure Fund to invest in domestic infrastructure. Therefore, the agency in charge of Sovereign Investment Fund should be saddled with the responsibility to accept participants’ funds for constructing roads, and the reciprocal payment from the government of the federation to pay participants or beneficiaries as and when due.