The Executive Chairman of the Nigeria Revenue Service, formerly the Federal Inland Revenue Service, Zacch Adedeji, has asked security agencies to be on alert over planned nationwide protests against the new tax law.

Controversy has surrounded the tax law which came to effect on January 1, 2026, with many civil society groups, opposition political parties, business leaders and some lawmakers in the National Assembly calling on the Tinubu administration to postpone its implementation, particularly following reports that the document may have been doctored.

The Presidency has denied the allegation, saying the reactions were unnecessary.

Speaking, Adedeji accused some people in the country of trying to frustrate the tax law, saying the new tax regime will benefit the country.

“I’m using this time to call all the security agencies to be on alert,” he said in an interview on Arise Television on Sunday., stressing that the reform was for the interest of the poor, but was being frustrated by some persons.

“These are the people… that just want to frustrate the benefit of this reform,” Adedeji declared. He warned that those pushing anti-tax agitations are unpatriotic elements determined to derail the country’s fiscal reforms.

“Those people you see promoting all this rumour, all this misinformation are those people that are avoiding taxes, that there is no way out for, based on the digitalisation that we brought on board,” he said.

Adedeji said tax reform was a clear campaign promise of President Bola Tinubu and a necessary response to what he described as a fragmented tax system that could not sustain the level of development the President envisaged.

“Tax reform is one of the promises made by Mr President from his inaugural speech,” he said. “From the beginning, he made it his point of duty that we need to start early to reform the tax system, which is the real foundation for any sustainable economy in the world.”

He recalled that the President set up a committee headed by Taiwo Oyedele, which, according to him, spent a year consulting stakeholders and preparing recommendations that were then processed by the National Assembly through public hearings and regional engagements before the President assented to the bill in June 2024.

Responding to claims by some lawmakers and commentators that the gazetted version of the Nigeria Tax Administration and Other Matters Act differed from what was passed by the National Assembly, Adedeji dismissed the allegations as baseless.

“No, like I said earlier, I don’t want to delve into those rumours,” he said. “For example, all these comparisons that you are mentioning now, honestly, I don’t know where you find them because nobody, except the National Assembly, has the right to the vote book. They are the ones to give us the gazetted law as passed, which… they’ve released… as passed, which is the only thing we have.”

He insisted that the only document relevant to the NRS is the gazetted Act transmitted by the legislature.

“I don’t even need to see the harmonised bill. I don’t need to see any of those things,” he said. “The only thing I need to see is the gazetted bill, which they have given to me. All these processes are internal processes of the National Assembly, which is purely a separation of powers.”

Adedeji stressed that the tax authorities had no role in altering any legislation and said the executive had “no place in the law” to tamper with bills passed by parliament. He also clarified that while the law took effect from June, some rate changes were delayed to give companies time to adjust.

He framed the reform as an attempt to create fairness rather than increase the tax burden.

“In one summary, the whole essence of reform is to tax right, not tax more,” he said. “We just want to tax right, fairness, transparency, and then consolidate the whole system in order to simplify and unify the process of revenue administration.”

He said the administration would focus on taxing profits and prosperity rather than capital and poverty, insisting that the poor are the biggest beneficiaries of the reform due to exemptions on basic consumption.

“If you look at all the exemptions, you will discover that more than 95 per cent of the poor are totally exempted,” he claimed. “Imagine that we remove VAT on all food items… The same thing on transportation… So if you look at the total and the net benefit, the poor are the most beneficiaries of this tax reform.”

On complaints that bank transfer charges and VAT deductions are rising, he said many of the grievances blamed on the federal reform are either bank charges or state-level personal income taxes, adding that the NRS mainly administers company taxes.

He also denied reports that the government now monitors individual bank transfers, saying, “Narration or whatever, it’s just misinformation. There is nothing about that in the tax law.”

On the requirement for banks to report large lodgements, he said the thresholds predated the new law and did not mean that every large transaction would be taxed, while the reform of minimum tax showed that the government did not intend to tax capital.

He also defended the memorandum of understanding with France on digital taxation, saying Nigeria was not exposing taxpayer information to foreign authorities.

Turning to the restructuring of the Federal Inland Revenue Service into the Nigeria Revenue Service, he said the change represented an institutional overhaul, not a cosmetic rebranding. According to him, six months of preparatory work went into integrating systems and building technological capacity.

“Most of those manual activities that encourage human intervention have been removed totally,” he said. “A dedicated department is now for technology because we know the future actually belongs to those data-driven organisations.”

He acknowledged there could be operational challenges but said, “Even if there will be glitches, there are challenges, we have a contingency plan because we are administrators.”

Addressing distrust over government revenue use, Adedeji said reforms were already improving fuel supply and state finances, adding: “If you go to states now, go and see how much states collected before, how much they are collecting now… I’m very sure this year, 2026, people will feel more of the impact of the government.”

He rejected claims that the tax regime could be used to target opposition figures ahead of the 2027 elections, insisting the President was acting in the national interest.

On the threat of protests by student groups and opposition parties, Adedeji warned that the law could not be suspended through street action and asked security agencies to remain alert.

“So when people say they want to suspend the law, does that mean the whole law has been repealed?” he asked, “We subscribe ourselves to democracy where there are rules of law. So no individual, except in an emergency, can suspend the law. The law passed by the National Assembly is law.”

“When you see the group of people, they say, ‘Oh, this is what we want to see.’ They have never read the law,” he added. “Let them read the law, and how does the law affect them. And they should wait for the results, not mass or mob action.”

The Punch