Daily Watch

6th July 2015

  • Former vice president, Namadi Sambo, has come under fire because of the opacity in payments related to the sale of power assets. A Canadian firm, CPCS Transcom, was paid $10 million for “advisory services” by the Niger Delta Power Holding Company (NDPHC) for the privatization of 10 National Integrated Power Project (NIPP) plants, while it was paid a far less $6.663 million for a much bigger job – the privatization of 11 distribution companies (discos) and 6 generation companies (gencos) of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN). The template used for the PHCN deal (which was conducted earlier) was the same adopted for the NDPHC. Sambo was the chairman of both the National Council on Privatisation (NCP) and the NDPHC.
  • The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) has announced that it generated more than N1.85 trillion in taxes between January and June this year. N697 billion was collected as Petroleum Profit Tax, N778 billion was received as Company Income Tax and N376 billion as Value Added Tax (VAT). Sunday Odugbesan, acting chairman of the FIRS said the Petroleum Profit Tax generated as at March this year (N50 billion), was the worst performance from the oil industry in the last 15 years. Revenue from new surcharges on luxury items is yet to take effect.
  • The Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) is hoping to work in closer collaboration with foreign embassies to identify targeted investors to be attracted into the non-oil sector of the Nigerian economy, with a new strategic framework known as “The NIPC Diamond Project – A future beyond Oil”.