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The Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, has revealed that it is working with some commercial banks in Nigeria to recover the sum of N1.8 trillion from accounts of MultiChoice Nigeria Limited and MultiChoice Africa.
This was contained in a statement issued by the FIRS Chairman, Muhammad Nami, on Thursday.
According to the statement, the service decided to involve the banks as agents to aid in freezing the accounts over the inability of the groups to grant FIRS access to its servers for audit.
The FIRS Chairman had accused the companies of persistently breaching all agreements and undertakings with the service.
Mr Nami stated that the group refused to respond to correspondences, saying “and are not transparent as they deliberately refused to allow FIRS to access their important records”.
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He said: “Particularly, MCN has avoided giving the FIRS accurate information on the number of its subscribers and income.
“The companies are involved in the under-remittance of taxes which necessitated a critical review of the tax-compliance level of the company.”
He lamented that some companies come into the country to “infringe on our tax laws by indulging in tax evasion.
The chairman said: “There is no doubt that broadcasting, telecommunications and the cable-satellite industries have changed the face of communication in Nigeria.
“However, when it comes to tax compliance, some companies are found wanting. They do with impunity in Nigeria what they dare not try in their countries of origin.”
