Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, has regretted billions of naira in losses to the country from tax exemptions granted by past administrations.

Dogara has accordingly expressed support for a plan by the federal government to suspend the issuance of Negotiable Duty Credit Certificate.

The Speaker who expressed support for  Export Expansion Grant (EEG) as one of the tools that can strengthen the manufacturing sector, stated these when he received members of the Manufacturing Association of Nigeria (MAN) in his office on Thursday.

A statement issued by his spokesman, Turaki Hassan, said Dogara explained that when he  he was chairman of the House Committee on Customs, he was privy to a lot of sharp practices in the use of Negotiable Duty   Certificate which led to loss of revenue to the federal government.

“On the issue of the Export Expansion Grant, EEG, we will look into that but the issue of the  Negotiable Duty Credit Certificate, when I was chairman of Customs Committee, to be candid, I queried some aspects of the practice which I sincerely believed were not in the best interest of the nation,” he said.

He added: “My thinking was if that instrument was meant to help a particular manufacturer, why do you make it negotiable? Why is it that such an instrument can be negotiated by a third party and the value claimed by a third party? Why is it not just given to a dedicated manufacturer who must use it? And we all know that there were some foreign nationals who because they knew some people in government, got these negotiable instruments and they negotiated them to third parties who were not manufacturers in any sense and they were using it to pay Customs duty, they were importers of maybe rice, sugar and other commodities like that but when you check the import duties they were netting them off against negotiable import duties certificate because it was negotiated by so called manufacturers who were not truly manufacturers but had negotiated it to them.”

Dogara, however, said adjustments could be made to the conditions for issuing the facility, explaining that, “our thinking is that if this scheme must continue, then we must use it to pay for raw material that you are utilizing in your factory in Nigeria. It must not be negotiated. And I guess that is the aspect of the practice that led to what we are talking about, government deciding to take another look at it. Because we were losing so much money through payments made by this instrument. “ ORDERPAPER.Ng