The revenue target of N1 trillion from Stamp duties by the Nigerian government and the loss of $34 billion revenue by African oil producers due to Covid-19 pandemic are the leading stories in Nigerian newspapers on Wednesday.
The Punch newspaper reports that the Nigerian Government is looking to generate an annual revenue of N1 trillion from the collection of stamp duties.
This was disclosed on Tuesday at the inauguration of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Audit and Recovery of Back Years Stamp Duties in Abuja.
It said the committee was part of moves to recover a backlog of unremitted revenues accruing to it through stamp duty tax in the last five years.
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, who represented the President, Muhammadu Buhari, noted that there was assurance that the collection from stamp duties would be second to oil revenue.
The newspaper reports that the National Assembly and electricity distribution companies have asked the Federal Government to subsidise eletricity consumption.
The Discos had on Monday told the National Assembly leadership that the only condition to halt tariff hike was for the Federal Government to bear the difference between the current tariff and the proposed one.
The President of the Nigerian Senate, Ahmad Lawan; and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, on Tuesday insisted that the planned hike in electricity tariff in the country was not timely.
Both lawmakers were in the Presidential Villa to meet Muhammadu Buhari. Although details of their meeting were not disclosed, the lawmakers may have spoken to the President on the imperative of the subsidy.
The Punch also reports that the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is estimated to cost Nigeria and other oil exporters in Africa a total of about $34bn in revenue.
According to the International Monetary Fund, the projected decline in revenue is attributable to the dwindling global crude oil prices.
IMF’s Director, African Department, Abebe Selassie, disclosed this at the Africa Ministerial Roundtable on COVID-19 impact on the energy sector in Africa.
The fund noted that African governments would be under intense budget pressure and rise in debt burden, adding that such burden would be higher among oil exporting countries. It said if the pandemic persists, it could transform profoundly the demand for energy. “The shock is certainly crippling fiscal resources in the short run, but it should not be allowed to wipe out the achievements in terms of human development over the last two decades,” Selassie stated.
ThisDay reports that the present economic downturn is expected to weigh heavily on the Nigerian banking sector in 2020, with loan growth projected to decelerate from 14 percent year-on-year in 2019, to 2.5 percent in 2020.
Fitch, one of the leading global rating agencies made the prediction in its latest: “Nigeria Banking & Financial Services Report.”
However, the firm anticipated that loan growth would improve slightly in 2021, to 4.3 per cent. Fitch stated that downside risks in the sector are elevated due to the Covid-19 pandemic and a weakened oil sector.
It further stated that demand for credit was set to weaken amid reduced economic activity and elevated uncertainty among consumers and businesses, while deteriorating asset quality will make banks more cautious in issuing loans.
The newspaper says that marginally favourable performance recorded by the Nigerian manufacturing sector in the second half of the 2019 has been attributed largely to the border closure announced by the federal government last year.
During the period under review, the Manufacturing Production Value (MPV) of the Nigerian manufacturing sector grew by N2.77 trillion in the second half of 2019, which represented 41.8 percent increase when compared to its performance within the same period in 2018.
This was revealed in the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) Economic Review of the Second Half of 2019, which stated that “the increase in manufacturing production within the period was ascribable to improved volume of activity in some sectors on account of the border closure and the relative tranquility in the foreign exchange market.”
In addition, the review also showed that in the second half of 2019, inventory of unsold finished manufactured goods dropped marginally in the sector to at N202.16 billion, down by N23.73 billion (10.5 percent) when compared with N225.89 billion recorded in the corresponding half of 2018.
“The development can have attributed to the closure of land borders of the country within the ECOWAS regions which made Nigerians resulting to the purchase more of locally manufactured goods in the period,” said MAN.
GIK/APA