FG GIVES FURTHER CLARIFICATION ON BANK REGISTRATION, APOLOGIZED FOR MISINFORMING THE PUBLIC

The Federal Inland Revenue Service has clarified the directive on self certification by bank account holders.

The Federal Government Twitter account had erroneously tweeted that all bank account holders in Nigeria were to obtain the self certification forms from their bank. The tweet has now been deleted.

In 2014 the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) had developed a common reporting standard (CRS) with which members could exchange information about people that have bank accounts and other financial dealings in multiple countries. Read more about the CRS here.

https://www.oecd.org/tax/automatic-exchange/common-reporting-standard/

In compliance with that protocol, people who have bank accounts in other countries and foreigners who have bank accounts in Nigeria are required to obtain, fill and submit the self certification forms. This does not apply to all bank account holders in Nigeria. (This is to enable governments to collect tax from their citizens that are based abroad). The banks are expected to know the customers that this directive applies to (due to the Know Your Customer [KYC] programme) and to inform them of the directive.

Here is the FIRS statement.

FIRS Nigeria @firsNigeria