A Tax Tribunal sitting in Kaduna on Thursday granted a request by the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, to settle the 4-year long case of non-remittance of Pay-As-You-Earn (PAYE) tax, amounting to N6 billion out of court.
The Kaduna State Board of Internal Revenue had on January 16, 2014 instituted a case against the ABU for failure to remit the PAYE tax from 2007 to 2012.
Counsel to the revenue service, Mr Francis Kozah, prayed the tribunal, chaired by Umar Adamu, to ask the institution to pay all outstanding arrears, including interest and penalty as stated by law.
Kozah, however, told the tribunal that ABU had earlier requested for out-of-court settlement and that the board had agreed to hear them.
He said that the sitting was scheduled for the first week of December.
He also informed the tribunal of the change of nomenclature from Kaduna State Board of Internal Revenue to Kaduna State Internal Revenue Service (KDIRS).
This followed the passage of the Kaduna State Tax Codification and consolidation Law in 2016.
Counsel to ABU, Mr M Garba, requested that the case be adjourned for four weeks to allow the parties sit and resolve the dispute.
Responding, the tribunal chairman regretted that the case had been on hold since January 2014 due to the non-constitution of the tribunal.
Adamu said that if the parties failed to settle issue, the tribunal would take a decision to proceed to hear the matter.
He then, adjourned the case to the second week of January 2019, adding that the parties would be notified of the substantive date in due course.
Similarly, the tribunal also adjourned the case between KDIRS and Kaduna Polytechnic to December 12, over the institution’s non-remittance of PAYE to the tune of N3.4 billion to KDIRS.
The amount was a cummulation of non-remittance of PAYE to the Kaduna State Government from 2007 to 2012.
Counsel to Kaduna Polytechnic, Mr Andrew Nwako, appealed to the tribunal to give both parties two weeks to settle the issue out of court.
Kozah, who represented KDIRS did not object and the chairman of the tribunal granted the request. (NAN)
