Nasarawa State Governor, Abdullahi Sule, on Saturday disclosed that he openly criticised the original Value Added Tax component of President Bola Tinubu’s tax reform, warning that pushing the proposed increase through at a time of high inflation would have hurt ordinary Nigerians.
Sule made the disclosure while receiving the Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, and the Renewed Hope Ambassadors National Media Tour team at the Nasarawa State Government House in Lafia, on the second leg of a nationwide inspection of federal and state infrastructure projects that had earlier taken the delegation through Benue State.
Sule said the President listened to the concerns of governors like him and ultimately revised the changes to the Tax Bill.
He stated, “I don’t praise-sing. When the president was misled about taxes, I criticised the matter openly. People misunderstood the matter, and when we visited the President, he said, ‘Sule, go and meet Zacch Adedeji and the current Minister of Finance [Taiwo Oyedele]. If you make the changes, if they agree, it’s okay.
“I said, ‘Mr President, that’s what we wanted from you.’ Governors were pushing me that I was the one to talk, and I spoke. And when we went, we made the changes.”
