The Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), said it was targeting to generate about N500 billion as Education Tax in 2021 fiscal year.
Mr. Kashim Imam, Chairman, TETFund Board of Trustees, said this at the 2020 Joint Interactive Forum organised by TETFund and Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) in Port Harcourt on Tuesday.
Imam said that the fund would be raised from two per cent of assessable profit tax contributions from oil and gas companies in the country.
“We decided to organise this interactive forum to see how we can improve collection of Education tax, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic.
“For 2020, we set a target of N277 billion and so far, FIRS has realised about N235 billion as at the end of September.
“For 2021, we are targeting to raise N500 billion Education tax and we are confident that the FIRS can raise the fund.
“We decided to raise our target to enable TETFund carry out more interventions in the various universities in the country,” the chairman said.
Imam said that TETFund had built several infrastructure in tertiary institutions across the country, including 75 completed and ongoing projects in University of Lagos.
”Others are 68 projects in Lagos State University; 68 in University of Port Harcourt; and 40 in Rivers State University.
“So, I can confidently say that the Education tax collected from the private sector has made a significant impact in the tertiary institutions.
“We commend FIRS and challenge them to do more to enable us to effectively realise our mandate,” he said.
Mr. Muhammad Nami, FIRS Executive Chairman, assured the commitment of the service to achieving the targets and objectives of TETFund.
Nami who was represented by Mr. Ezra Zubairu, FIRS Coordinating Director. also assured the fund of recovering lost revenue accruable to it.
“At FIRS, we are doing so much to increase revenue collection of the Federal Government.
“So far, we have collected about N4.12 trillion for the period of January to October in spite of the Financial Act 2019 incentives, COVID-19 challenges and palliatives concessions.
“We collected N2.79 trillion from non-oil revenue and N1.33 trillion from oil revenue between January and October 2020,” he said.