The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) says there should be re-introduction of excise duty on all soft drinks produced in the country.
Comptroller-general of the NCS, Hameed Ali made this call during an interactive session on the 2022-2024 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) organised by the house of representatives committee on finance.
Responding to James Faleke, chairman of the committee, when he asked why NCS does not charge excise duty on non-alcoholic drinks, the NCS boss said the service has made several submissions for alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks to be taxed.
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Ali said “On several cases, I have made submissions. Mr Chairman is aware that I have been on this battle that we should re-excise the companies that were de-excised in 2019,”
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“What we have been fighting for is that if alcohol beverages and tobacco are injurious to our health that is why the government decided to tax them, the carbonated drinks are equally injurious to our health and they should be taxed.
“I have sung this song for many years now, Coca-Cola is producing in this country and it is not being taxed. There is nowhere you go in the world that Coca-Cola is not paying tax to its host country, but Coca-Cola in this country is not paying anything because of the government unwillingness to re-excise those companies.
“For us, we have been battling for it, and I hope that one day, we will start collecting.”
