A thick pall of uncertainty has enveloped the Tax Reform Acts due to take effect on Thursday, January 1, 2026, following the alleged discrepancies discovered between the versions passed by the National Assembly and those gazetted by the Federal Government.
A member of the House of Representatives from Sokoto, Abdussamad Dasuki, had penultimate week called his colleagues’ attention to the alleged alterations, revealing that the new tax reform laws officially gazetted by the Federal Government were different from those passed by the lawmakers and sent to President Bola Tinubu for assent.
The House of Representatives had passed the four tax reform bills in March, while the Senate concluded work on them in May, 2025. President Bola Tinubu signed the bills into law in June, describing them as the most significant overhaul of Nigeria’s tax system in decades.
The laws are: the Nigeria Tax Act, 2025; the Nigeria Tax Administration Act, 2025; the Joint Revenue Board of Nigeria (Establishment) Act, 2025; and the Nigeria Revenue Service (Establishment) Act, 2025.
Specifically, it was discovered that substantial provisions were allegedly inserted into the new tax laws, deleted from them or modified after they had been passed by both chambers of the National Assembly.
Several oversight, accountability, and reporting mechanisms approved by the legislature were also allegedly removed in the final Acts, while new coercive and fiscal powers, including arrest powers, garnishee without court order, compulsory USD computation, and appeal security deposits, allegedly appeared in the gazetted versions without legislative appurtenances. These changes, the lawmakers argued, cannot be classified as mere clerical or editorial corrections.
The development momentarily sparked wide public outrage, keeping the ever boisterous social media buzzing, just as angry outbursts over the alleged alterations have similarly kept the traditional media whirling since then.
Professional groups, including the influential Nigeria Bar Association(NBA), the central Labour union, civil society organizations, ethnic and regional groups as well as political leaders are in a rage, demanding a thorough probe into the allegedly unconstitutional post-legislative tweaks effected in the the tax reform laws.
Some of the respondents are also demanding that the implementation of the new tax laws, which the government declared are designed to support economic growth, ease pressure on households, and encourage formal business activity, be suspended till all investigative processes into the malfeasance are concluded and the authenticity of the newly passed laws are established.
In a strongly-worded statement issued last Tuesday, the NBA President, Mazi Afam Osigwe (SAN), said the controversies surrounding the laws threaten the integrity, transparency, and credibility of Nigeria’s legislative process.
He warned that the issues strike at the heart of constitutional governance and called for a comprehensive, open, and transparent investigation to restore public confidence.
Osigwe said: “The Nigerian Bar Association considers it imperative that a comprehensive, open, and transparent investigation be conducted to clarify the circumstances surrounding the enactment of the laws and to restore public confidence in the legislative process. Until these issues are fully examined and resolved, all plans for the implementation of the Tax Reform Acts should be immediately suspended.”
The lawyers’ umbrella body further warned that the legal and policy uncertainty resulting from the controversy could unsettle the business environment, erode investors’ confidence, and create unpredictability for individuals, businesses, and institutions expected to comply with the laws.
Former Senate Leader, Ali Ndume, made a similar call the following day, urging President Tinubu to suspend the implementation of the disputed Tax Reform Acts. Ndume, who represents Borno South Senatorial District, urged the President to set up an ad hoc committee to verify the authenticity of the laws and investigate the alleged alterations.
He warned that implementing the laws without resolving the allegations would create legitimacy challenges and undermine public trust.
“With the controversy surrounding it, the President should constitute a team to verify the veracity of the claim and act accordingly.
“As a responsive leader that he has always been, he should look into it to find out whether the claim of alterations was genuine so that he will do the needful to bring the controversy to rest,” Ndume added.
Following the public backlash and growing concerns, the two chambers of the National Assembly have commenced an institutional review of the four Tax Reform Acts, specifically addressing the controversies surrounding their passage, presidential assent and subsequent publication in the Official Gazette.
The House spokesman, Akin Rotimi, in a statement issued on Boxing Day, noted that recent public commentaries have raised questions over the harmonisation of the versions passed by the Senate and the House of Representatives, the documents transmitted for presidential assent, and the texts eventually gazetted by the Federal Government.
Rotimi said the House had constituted a seven-man Ad Hoc Committee after a member raised the matter under a Point of Order (Privileges) during plenary, to address the issues.
According to the statement, the committee is working alongside other relevant committees of the National Assembly and in collaboration with the management of the legislature to establish a clear sequence of events.
“The institutional review is aimed at identifying any lapses, irregularities, or external interferences, should any be established, in the legislative and administrative handling of the Acts,” the House said. The Senate came out with a similar statement.
As part of measures to ensure clarity and protect the integrity of the legislative record, the leadership of the National Assembly has also directed the Clerk to the federal legislature to re-gazette the Acts and issue Certified True Copies of the versions duly passed by both chambers.
The directive was jointly issued under the leadership of Senate President Godswill Akpabio and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Abbas Tajudeen.
Rotimi added that “The re-gazetting exercise is an administrative step meant solely to authenticate and accurately reflect the decisions of the National Assembly, and not an admission of any legislative defect.
“This review is strictly confined to institutional processes and procedures. It does not constitute, imply, or concede any defect in the exercise of legislative authority by the House of Representatives or the Senate.”
The probe is welcome. It is a bold move in the right direction. The allegation is a weighty one because tinkering with a validly passed Act of Parliament is despicable. It is not only ultra vires, as it violates Sections 4 and 58 of the 1999 Constitution, which vest the law-making power exclusively in the National Assembly; it is a travesty of constitutional democracy and the rule of law.
Under the principles of the separation of powers, the responsibilities of each of the three arms of government and the checks that balance those responsibilities are unambiguously spelt out.
In essence, while the legislature makes the laws for the country, the judiciary interprets them and the executive implements the laws for the good of society. The executive or any person purporting to act on behalf of the executive has no constitutional authority to alter a bill after it has been passed.
Any post-legislative alteration is unconstitutional and void to the extent of the alteration. Hence, the moment the legislature passes a bill into law, only the judiciary can alter it through judicial interpretations or pronouncements.
The president can only assent to any bill passed by the legislature or withhold his assent (vetoes it) if he does not agree with it. In that case, the bill is typically returned to the legislature, which may then attempt to override the veto, by passing the bill into law with two-thirds majority votes.
The repugnant alterations must, therefore, be redressed to protect the credibility and the sanctity of the legislative process as well as the principles of separation of powers.
Hence, the Federal Government should raise an independent panel of legal, legislative and fiscal-cum-tax experts to probe into the the alterations, the circumstances and those who might have purportedly acted for the President to commit the infraction.
Everyone found culpable should be prosecuted or sanctioned commensurate to the nature of culpability. Appropriate legal and constitutional bulwarks must also be erected against the gazetting process as a safeguard against future abuse.
It is also imperative for the government to accede to the popular admonitions by concerned stakeholders to immediately suspend the implementation of the Tax Reform Acts scheduled for January 1 (this Thursday), pending the outcome of the institutional review being undertaken by the National Assembly.
It is odious for the Chairman of the Presidential Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms Committee, Taiwo Oyedele, to have insisted that the new tax reform laws would take effect from January, 2026,as scheduled, despite the overwhelming public admonitions for their suspension.
It smacks of executive hubris and outright duplicity for Oyedele to say that the government welcomes the institutional review being undertaken by the National Assembly and yet insist that the implementation will proceed, even while the process of clearing the fog around the controversy over the unconstitutional alterations is still unraveling.
He claimed last Friday, while interacting with newsmen in Lagos, that the decision to proceed with implementation as planned is driven by the pro-people nature of the reforms, which, he said, are designed to reduce the tax burden on ordinary Nigerians and stimulate economic growth.
He enthused on his WhatsApp platform that under the new system, low- and middle-income earners, small businesses, and even large companies will experience significant relief.
“You will pay less or no tax if you are in the bottom 98 per cent of income earners,” he said, explaining that essential goods and services would become cheaper because “food will cost less because VAT on food, education and healthcare will be removed.”
Agreed. But the excuse is rather tenuous. It will be more beneficial for everyone for the authorities to heed public admonitions against rushing to implement the Tax Reform Acts while the uncertainty about their authenticity lingers.
If the government goes ahead with the scheduled implementation, as it has insisted, while the controversy over the alterations is yet to be convincingly redressed, it may unwittingly lay a weak foundation for the new laws by eroding the trust and confidence of the stakeholders, especially individuals, businesses, institutions and other taxpayers, who are expected to comply with them.