The minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Otumba Niyi Adebayo, has pleaded with the House of Representatives Public Accounts Committee to give him more time to meet with his officials on issues regarding certificates of capital allowances given to companies between 2017 and 2021.
He made the plea when he appeared before the committee at the resumed investigative hearing over alleged loss of revenue in Free Trade Zones.
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It could be recalled that the committee had summoned the minister based on an audit query by the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation.
The query was over 4,672 certificates of capital allowance worth about N7.9 trillion given to 2,203 companies between January 2017 and December 2021.
Documents presented to the committee have also revealed that the ministry had recorded what they described as the disallowance of N101.6 billion.
According to the documents, disallowances are findings after an audit that a business or individual taxpayer was not entitled to a deduction or other tax benefit claimed on a tax return.
On the other hand, Capital Allowance is the practice of allowing a taxpayer to get tax relief on capital expenditure by allowing it to be deducted against their annual taxable income.
“It is akin to a tax-deductible expense and is available in respect of qualifying capital expenditure incurred on the provision of certain assets in use for the purposes of a trade or rental services and effectively allow a taxpayer to write off the cost of an asset over a period of time”.
In his submission, the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Otumba Niyi Adebayo, said the issues were just being brought to his notice at the hearing.
He told the committee that he would need time to sit with the officials of the ministry including the permanent secretary and prepare a more comprehensive answer to the queries.
The minister appealed to the committee not to disclose the figures involved in the issues of capital allowances in the public domain.
According to him, disclosing the figures will lead to Nigerians forming an opinion that is not a true reflection of the issue at hand.
On his part, chairman of the committee, Wole Oke (PDP, Osun) told the minister that before the coming of the Finance Act, only permanent secretaries were invited to answer such queries.
He said, with the coming into effect of the Finance Act 2020, the invitation is now being extended to ministers.
