The National Assembly leadership wants Nigerians to believe that re-gazetting the tax law is a confidence-building exercise. In reality, it is an admission that the process has gone badly wrong—and that no one is quite sure who changed what, when, or on whose authority.
Let us begin with the obvious. The 10th National Assembly, under the leadership of Senate President Godswill Akpabio and Speaker of the House Tajudeen Abbas, passed a tax bill. The President assented to it. It was gazetted. At that point, the law was complete. Constitutionally sealed. No returns accepted.
After that moment, the text ceased to belong to committees, consultants, ministries, or “technical teams.” It belonged to the Nigerian people.
So when Nigerians later discovered that the version circulating from the Federal Ministry of Information and National Orientation differed materially from the version appearing on the Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms Committee website—chaired by Taiwo Oyedele—the question was not academic. It was existential: who touched the law after assent?
Instead of answering that question, the response has been to re-gazette the law, as though the issue were a misplaced comma rather than a potentially altered statute. This is where the problem deepens.
Re-gazetting is not a constitutional reset button. It cannot lawfully be used to adjust substantive provisions—appeal thresholds, penalties, enforcement powers—without returning to the National Assembly and obtaining fresh assent from the President. Any other approach is legislative freelancing.
Yet Nigeria now finds itself with three “official” versions of the same tax law:
- One issued through the Federal Ministry of Information
- One hosted by the Fiscal Reforms Committee
- And now a third being advanced via re-gazetting, apparently with the blessing of the National Assembly bureaucracy
Which one did lawmakers vote on?
Which one did the President assent to?
Which one is the Attorney-General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN) prepared to defend in court?
Because make no mistake: earlier gazetted laws do not evaporate because a newer version appears. Unless withdrawn by statute or nullified by a court, they remain official. Nigeria is not governed by “latest PDF” rules.
This confusion alone renders enforcement reckless. How does the Federal Inland Revenue Service enforce a law when three competing texts exist? Which version should taxpayers obey? Which version should judges interpret? These are not clever legal puzzles; they are governance failures.
But the gravest issue remains carefully avoided. The allegation is not merely that there was confusion. It is that a law, properly passed and assented to, may have been materially altered afterward. If that occurred, responsibility does not float in the air. It sits somewhere—within the legislative bureaucracy, the executive machinery, or both.
Re-gazetting does not resolve that allegation. It obscures it.
The responsible course of action is obvious and urgent:
- Suspend enforcement of the tax law immediately
- Publish the certified harmonised version that was actually passed by the National Assembly
- Clarify which version received presidential assent
- And identify who authorised any post-assent alterations, if any occurred
Until this is done, no amount of gazette gymnastics will restore credibility.
A constitutional democracy cannot function where laws mutate between passage and publication, and no one is held accountable. Nigeria cannot be governed like a shared WhatsApp document with editing rights no one wants to admit to.
Until clarity, legality, and accountability are restored, this tax law—no matter how well-intentioned—has neither the moral nor the legal authority to be enforced.
Centre for Nigeria Progress 