Tax Reform Law: Altering legislations through Official Gazette, illegal – Lawyers

By Ikechukwu Nnochiri

ABUJA– Legal practitioners in the country have weighed in on the allegation that tax reform laws passed by the National Assembly and assented to by President Bola Tinubu, were altered in the copy that was officially gazetted.

A group of concerned lawmakers in the House of Representatives had raised the issue on Wednesday, citing examples of gazetted copies of the laws currently in circulation at the Federal Ministry of Information.

According to the lawmakers, amendments contained in the gazetted copies, lacked legislative backing.

For instance, the legislators noted that alien provisions that included coercive and fiscal powers (e.g., arrest powers, garnish without court order, compulsory USD computation, appeal security deposits), appeared in the gazetted copies without legislative approval.

Reacting to this development on Thursday, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mr. Dayo Akinlaja, SAN, said it was unconstitutional for a gazetted law to vary in content with a bill that was passed National Assembly.

He said: “The constitutional responsibility of the President is to give or withhold assent to a bill duly passed by the National Assembly.

“Once a bill is passed by the National Assembly, the President is required to sign it as presented where he is disposed to giving his assent.

“If the President finds anything objectionable, uncomfortable or unacceptable in the bill as presented, he is required to return the bill and request for amendments to take care of his concerns.

“Where the National Assembly, after due reconsideration, agrees to amend to accommodate the spotlighted concerns, the bill will be duly passed again and sent back for presidential assent.

“In the context of Sections 58 and 59 of the 1999 Constitution, it is unconstitutional and invalid for a gazetted law to be different from the contents of a bill as passed by the National Assembly.”

Similarly, an Abuja-based lawyer and activist, Mr. Deji Adeyanju, described the alteration of the tax reform bill as a mockery of Nigeria’s democracy.

“There are disturbing reports that the tax reform bill assented to by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is materially different from the version duly passed by the National Assembly. If this allegation is true, it represents the greatest mockery of Nigeria’s democracy since 1999.

“In a sane constitutional democracy, the President can only assent to the exact bill passed by the legislature. Any post-passage alteration, whether by omission, addition, or substitution, amounts to legislative fraud and an affront to the sovereignty of the Nigerian people!

“The Tinubu administration must immediately come clean with an explanation and publish the authenticated version of the bill passed by the National Assembly. Anything short of this shows that the Tinubu Administration is a criminal enterprise masquerading as a government, ” Adeyanju added.

Equally reacting to the development, another senior lawyer, Mr. Sylvester Emokhare, suggested a legal action to strike down the alleged offensive inclusions in the official gazetted copy.

He said: “Sections 4 and 58 of the 1999 Constitution, as amended, are very clear. Only the National Assembly, to the exclusion of every other institution of government, has the powers to make laws for the country.

“Likewise, the gazetted version of every law serves as official public record. It is the authority that enables enforcement.

“Therefore, the discrepancies noted by the House of Representatives, if found to be true, have raised serious constitutional concerns.

“What were provisions of the original bill that was passed by the National Assembly and signed into law by the president? At what point were those provisions altered?

“These are germane questions that deserve answers.

“As it stands, the National Assembly is expected to set up an ad hoc committee that would thoroughly investigate this issue because it is capable of undermining the integrity of our law making process.

“If it is established that indeed the gazetted copy differed in content with the law that was duly passed and assented to, it is either legislative steps are taken to correct the anomaly, or a legal action instituted to enable the court to nullify the altered law or strike down the offensive sections, as the case may be.”

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