Federal Government has empowered 53 consultants to verify remittances to the Federation Account by the 21 banks hired by the Federal Inland Revenue Service and the Nigeria Custom Service.
The verification and reconciliation exercise will cover a period of four and half years beginning from January 2008 to June 2012.
Inaugurating the consultants in Abuja on Thursday, the Chairman, Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission, Elias Mbam, said the lead consultant was expected to submit the final report on August 15.
Mbam said the exercise became imperative following irregularities in the remittances of revenue from collecting banks engaged by FIRS and NCS, which were observed by the Non-Oil Monitoring Committee and Mobilisation Department of RMAFC.
He said, “The commission made a presentation to the Federation Account Allocation Committee, which at its meeting held on March 9, 2012, approved that the commission should engage consultants to verify and reconcile revenue collection by the banks for both the FIRS and NCS in order to recover any excess deduction and stop further leakages.
Mbam said the exercise did not constitute an audit of the country’s revenue collecting agencies, but was aimed at ensuring that the collecting banks complied with the terms of their agreements with FIRS and NCS.
He disclosed that the office of the Accountant-General of the Federation had been advised to open a special account with the Central Bank of Nigeria into which recoveries during the exercise would be lodged.
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