Reps panel asks GTB to remit VAT collected through Remita for 8 years

The house of representatives has asked Guaranty Trust Bank (GTB) to remit value-added tax (VAT) received through the Remita platform between 2015 and 2022 to the federal government recovery account.

Remita is a financial technology used by the federal government to collect revenue from its agencies into the treasury single account (TSA).

Bamidele Salam, chairman of the public accounts committee (PAC) of the lower chamber, gave the directive on Thursday during the ongoing investigation into alleged revenue leakages through the Remita platform.

The committee is also investigating noncompliance with the standard operating procedure and other related matters.

Bamidele’s directive followed a unanimous resolution of the committee after scrutinising the records and listening to the management of the bank.

Responding to the committee, Ahmed Liman, executive director of GTB, said the bank did not remit the VAT for a period of eight years.

Liman said the bank believed that Remita had deducted the VAT before sharing commissions with the bank.

“We believe that Remita is saddled with the responsibility of sharing the commission fees between the payment-receiving parties,” the GTB boss said.

“In our mind, we think Remita has done the needful before sharing the fees between the parties.”

The executive director also said GTB charged 0.75 percent on all the players who used the Remita platform.

He added that the bank received N254,489,013 from the accountant general through Remita in 2018.

Aside from GTB, the committee is also scrutinising the records of other banks including Keystone, Zenith Bank, Sterling Bank, Polaris Bank, FCMB, Ecobank, and Wema.

On November 22, 2023, the green chamber resolved to investigate alleged revenue leakages through the Remita platform.

Earlier this year, the committee queried four commercial banks over N11.632 trillion revenue collected on behalf of the federal government through the Remita platform between the 2015 and 2022 fiscal years.

The financial institutions were Ecobank, Citi Bank, Access, and Fidelity.