“Tax Nigerians For Calls Above 3 Minutes” – CBN Governor Emefiele Begs Government

Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele has advised the Federal Government to tax Nigerians for every call above 3 minutes as part of plans to cushion the effect of the economic recession.

He said this while speaking at the Annual Bankers’ Dinner in Lagos on Friday.

He said the government could raise additional revenue by introducing the charge.

He said, “There are several ways we can raise additional revenue to finance the increased expenditure that is needed to engender fast and sustainable growth in the economy,”

Emefiele said, “I think we can consider introducing a negligible telecom surcharge to be entirely borne by the initiator of a call. In order to protect the poor and vulnerable amongst us, we could structure it to only take effect after the third minute of talk.

“Some analyses have indicated that the government could earn about N100 billion per annum from this alone. Obviously this surcharge will mainly be borne by middle and upper class people since I do not know many poor people who make calls for more than 3 minutes!”