By Henry Ojelu
Barely months after President Bola Tinubu assented to four landmark tax reform Acts aimed at overhauling Nigeria’s fiscal framework, a fresh controversy that threatens to undermine the credibility, legality and enforceability of the new laws before their scheduled commencement on January 1, 2026, erupted last week.
At the heart of the dispute are allegations by members of the House of Representatives that the versions of the tax laws published in the Federal Government Gazette differ materially from the harmonised texts passed by both chambers of the National Assembly.
The four Acts in question—the Nigeria Tax Act, Nigeria Tax Administration Act, Nigeria Revenue Service Act, and the Joint Revenue Board Act—were signed into law in June 2025 after months of legislative work, public hearings and inter-chamber harmonisation. They were presented as a bold attempt to simplify Nigeria’s complex tax regime, expand the revenue base and strengthen administration. However, what should have been a smooth transition to implementation has now become a constitutional and legal quagmire.
Following public outcry and internal dissent within the legislature, the Speaker of the House of Representatives constituted an ad-hoc committee to investigate the allegations. The committee is mandated to obtain the versions of the bills passed by the National Assembly, compare them line by line with the gazetted Acts, and determine whether discrepancies exist—and if so, how they arose. In this edition of Law and Human Right, four senior lawyers, Ibezimako Wogu, Prof. Gbenga Bamodu, Gbenga Ojo and Charles Ugwuanyi weighed in on the matter, warning that the controversy raises profound questions about legislative supremacy, separation of powers, the integrity of lawmaking processes, and the rule of law itself. Beyond the technicalities, they argued that if the allegations are substantiated, the implications could range from partial invalidity of the laws to a complete collapse of the new tax regime, with serious economic and governance consequences.
Post-assent alteration unconstitutional, unenforceable—Wogu
Providing a detailed constitutional analysis, Ibezimako Wogu, Partner and Head of Tax at Hermon, situates the controversy squarely within the supremacy of the Constitution and the limits of legislative power.
“The Constitution is supreme,” he explained, “and any law inconsistent with it is void to the extent of the inconsistency, by virtue of section 1(3). Federal legislative power is exercised only through bills passed by both Houses of the National Assembly and assented to by the President under section 58.”
According to Wogu, the legal status of an Act is not determined by when it comes into force, but by the moment presidential assent is given. He cites section 2 of the Interpretation Act, which provides that an Act is passed when the President assents to the bill, irrespective of commencement provisions.
He further relied on the Acts Authentication Act (AAA), which requires the Clerk of the National Assembly to prepare and certify a true copy of each bill as passed by both Houses, along with a Schedule of Bills presented to the President. That certificate, he notes, is “conclusive for all purposes.
“A copy of the Schedule published in the Federal Gazette is also conclusive evidence,” Wogu added, “and courts generally presume that official acts, including gazetting, are regular. But that presumption is rebuttable where credible evidence shows a departure from the prescribed procedure or text.”
The implication, he argued, is stark:”If a gazetted text departs substantively from the Clerk-certified ‘as-passed’ text that was assented to, the altered provisions are not the product of legislative power under sections 4 and 58 of the Constitution. They are ultra vires and invalid to the extent of the alteration.”
Wogu was emphatic that the “conclusive” language of the Acts Authentication Act does not authorise post-assent editing. “It protects the fact of passage and assent, but it does not permit printing to add, delete or modify what Parliament passed,” he said.
He urges the House ad-hoc committee to publish the Clerk-certified versions alongside the gazetted Acts for transparency. “Only the text passed by both Houses and assented to by the President is law. Where gazetted texts diverge, those divergences are unenforceable and constitutionally defective,” he said.
Given the time already elapsed since assent, Wogu suggested that enforcement should be paused pending clarification, with corrective legislative action taken if necessary to restore certainty.
Deviation from harmonised version undermines NASS will—Prof. Bamodu
Renowned scholar, Prof. Gbenga Bamodu frames the controversy as an assault on the very idea of parliamentary will.
He stated: “The will of Parliament is that the law is enacted in a particular form and with particular wording. That form and wording emerge only after the versions passed by the Senate and the House of Representatives have been harmonised.” According to him, it is this harmonised text that represents the collective will of the National Assembly and is presented to the President for assent. Any deviation at that stage demands explanation.
“If the version presented to and signed by the President is different,” Bamodu warned, “an explanation is called for—not least because it raises a suspicion of error at best, or fraud at worst.” He noted that the issue is particularly troubling given that taxation directly affects constitutional rights, economic planning and social obligations.
According to him: “There is the further question of how the courts will treat the validity of such a law, whether it remains valid simply because it bears presidential assent, or whether its validity will be queried on the basis that what was assented to does not represent the will of the National Assembly.”
For Bamodu, the controversy exposes deeper systemic weaknesses. “On a wider note, it is another call to attention on how we approach and uphold processes rigorously and with integrity,” he concluded.
Altering passed bills is dangerous escalation of impunity—Ojo
Constitutional lawyer, Gbenga Ojo takes a more activist stance, describing the controversy as a continuation of a troubling pattern.
He said: “It is not surprising. Nigeria is a country of lawlessness. With budgets, we have become accustomed to padding, a practice that is antithetical to the parliamentary procedure for passing appropriation bills. The public raised alarms, but they were swept under the carpet. We have now graduated to the illegal padding of bills passed by Parliament. I do not know whether there is any precedent for this obnoxious practice.
“We must hold the National Assembly to account through critical opinion and public-interest pressure to ensure that this practice is not sustained. I hold the view that even where the Executive is dissatisfied with a bill passed by the National Assembly, it can fine-tune its concerns, re-present them, and lobby members of the National Assembly to re-pass the bill. Resorting to “self-help” by tinkering with a bill to suit the Executive is unacceptable.
“If a padded bill is eventually assented to by the President, the National Assembly or civil society activists, through public-interest litigation, can challenge it in court to have the law set aside. A judicial pronouncement on this issue would be desirable, as it would deter the Executive from padding bills passed by the National Assembly.
“However, someone must be held responsible and punished for this act. It is a form of corruption. While it may not fall within the prosecutorial remit of the EFCC or ICPC, the police can dust off the law books, investigate, and prosecute the cabal behind this impunity. Corruption is not limited to financial or economic crimes; this is also a species of corruption that must be punished.
There must be criminal accountability if alteration occurred—Ugwuanyi
For Charles Ugwuanyi, the issue is even more grave. He said: “The concern raised is clearly one of forgery. The legal implications of this forgery depend on the stage at which it occurred. Were the bills forged before they were presented to the President for assent, or were the forgeries carried out on the assented bills—now Acts—before gazetting?
“If the Acts were distorted before gazetting, the gazetted version could be dismissed as a “printer’s devil” and corrected. However, if the President actually assented to corrupted and forged bills, then, in effect, there are no valid tax laws.
“In either scenario, forgery has occurred and a crime has been committed. Those responsible must be exposed. Yet, as has become commonplace, abductees are often released, received at Government House, and celebrated with pomp and pageantry, while nothing is said about the abductors. Similarly, ghost workers are frequently uncovered and the fraud blocked, but no heads roll.
“The frustration lies in the reality that there is little or no punishment for wrongdoing in Nigeria. This culture of impunity emboldens public office holders to engage in acts such as forging bills or laws. One hopes that the government of the day will change this narrative and make an example of those behind these forgeries, to demonstrate that the era of impunity without consequences is over.”
Conclusion
As Nigeria counts down to January 2026, the controversy over the new tax laws has become more than a technical dispute over texts. It is a test of constitutionalism, legislative credibility and institutional accountability.
Whether resolved through legislative clarification, corrective gazetting or judicial intervention, the respondents agree on one point: only fidelity to due process can restore confidence.
Until then, the shadow hanging over Nigeria’s tax reforms remains a sobering reminder that in law-making, process is not a formality—it is the law itself.
The post Why disputed tax acts are invalid without due process — Lawyers appeared first on Vanguard News.
