The chairman of the Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms, Taiwo Oyedele, has assured Nigerians that the new tax reforms will not trigger automatic debits from bank accounts, regardless of the transfer amount or description.

Speaking on Channels Television’s end-of-year special on Tuesday, Oyedele said no tax authority anywhere in the world has the capacity to pursue every individual, noting that tax enforcement typically targets high income earners rather than low income bank users.

“Nobody will debit your account. Any amount of money you transfer, whether it is 1 billion, whether it is 1,000, it doesn’t matter how you describe it. Nobody will debit your bank account,” the chairman said.

The chairman said concerns over bank debits have largely been driven by misinformation, adding that many Nigerians opposing the reforms are not in the income bracket targeted by the policy.

“The people that are fighting us the most are the people who don’t have 1 million in their bank account,” the chairman said.

“You know that the NDIC said 98 percent of bank holders in Nigeria can’t boast of 500k in their bank account. Those are the people fighting.

“I think something we underestimated in this reform. We said the current system is regressive, taxing the vulnerable more. Let us make it progressive. In fact, there was one of our meetings where we were saying it is going to be hard for these rich people to go out and be protesting because they don’t want people to know that they are rich.

“We underestimated how these guys can manipulate the average person to fight the fights on their behalf. Even against their own interests, that was what played out and it is totally unbelievable.

“I think something we underestimated in this reform. We said the current system is regressive, taxing the vulnerable more. Let us make it progressive. In fact, there was one of our meetings where we were saying it is going to be hard for these rich people to go out and be protesting because they don’t want people to know that they are rich.

“We underestimated how these guys can manipulate the average person to fight the fights on their behalf. Even against their own interests, that was what played out and it is totally unbelievable.

“There are content creators who admitted they make up to $10,000 a month. They don’t want to pay tax. You think they will go and create a content that says they want to tax $10,000 a month? They say they are going to debit your bank account so you can help them fight the reform.”

He explained that the reformed tax system is based on self-declaration, with taxpayers expected to disclose their income at the end of the year and pay tax accordingly.

According to the chairman, individuals who are exempt from tax will only need to declare their status, stressing that the process is being simplified to encourage compliance.