Daily business registration hits 10,000 daily after tax reforms – Oyedele

The tax reforms carried out by the Federal Government was encouraging the informal sector, leading to over 10,000 daily business registration with the Corporate Affairs Commission, the
Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, has said.

Oyedele gave the disclosure at the
BusinessDay 14th Annual CEO Forum in Lagos, noting that the reform was deliberately designed for the informal sector to share the prosperity of the nation.

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“By the way, with the new tax reforms, one of the things we did intentionally was ask: How do we encourage formalization?” he said.

He expressed satisfaction that the reform was not a failure, but rather, it exceeded expectations and has been very impressive seeing the economy being boosted.

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He quoted the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, as saying months ago that they didn’t know what the Federal Government did, but they had an average of 10,000 informal businesses applying to register with the CAC every single day.

He stressed the importance of leveraging on the reform to assist businesses, even as businesses have been lawfully exempted from taxes.

“If we help them build skills, access affordable capital, management skills, opportunities, and they grow, not only is it that they will stimulate growth and shared prosperity, we’ll better capture the value they add to the economy.”

The minister said the government’s revenue mobilisation agenda is focused on widening the tax net, simplifying compliance and leveraging technology.

“Our revenue mobilization agenda is not about raising tax rates to punish success. No. No. It is about widening the tax net, simplifying compliance, and leveraging technology. Our landmark tax reforms are designed to eliminate multiple taxation and drastically reduce compliance costs. This is not merely tax reform; it is a fiscal reset necessary for shared prosperity.”

He said prosperity would only be meaningful if it is shared, noting that the government is deliberately investing in human capital, vocational training and skills development, while supporting small and medium-sized enterprises.

“We are supporting small and medium-sized enterprises not as an act of charity—because it is not—but because they are the true engines of job creation and grassroots innovation.”

Oyedele said the government’s focus is to ensure that businesses formalise, grow and contribute to shared prosperity, adding that the country must move from stability to investment, productivity, job creation and rising real incomes.

“Nigeria has completed the grueling foundational work of restoring macroeconomic stability. Our shared responsibility now is to convert that stability into investment, convert investment into productivity, convert productivity into jobs, and jobs into rising real incomes for every Nigerian.”

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