FAAC demands recovery of N101.17bn misremitted by Customs
A financial audit conducted by OOM Professional Services has revealed discrepancies totaling around ₦101.17 billion in revenue remittances by the Nigeria Customs Service, leading the Federation Account Allocation Committee to demand a complete recovery and redistribution of the funds to the appropriate recipients.A document from the FAAC Post Mortem Sub-Committee, acquired on Monday, disclosed that misclassifications of funds and delays by commercial banks in remitting revenue greatly disrupted the required revenue sharing process, causing sub-national governments to miss out on their rightful allocations, according to The Punch.
The firm, which started in 2008 as Lanre Ogunwale & Co before rebranding to OOM Professional Services, was assigned by the Forum of Commissioners of Finance to conduct a thorough audit of Nigeria Customs Service remittances to the Federation Account for the 2022–2023 fiscal year.
The findings of the audit were presented at the FAAC plenary meeting held on May 16, 2025, where the chairman of the Forum informed members about the irregularities identified by the consultant.
Founded in 2008 as Lanre Ogunwale & Co and later rebranded as OOM Professional Services, the company was tasked by the Forum of Commissioners of Finance to perform an extensive review of Nigeria Customs Service remittances into the Federation Account for the 2022–2023 fiscal year.
This review resulted in a report that was delivered at the FAAC plenary session on May 16, 2025, during which the Forum’s chairman shared the irregularities found by the consultant with committee members.
Following discussions, the Federal Ministry of Finance directed the FAAC Post Mortem Sub-Committee to validate the findings and produce a report with recommendations.
A subsequent stakeholders' meeting took place on July 10, 2025, at Brick Wall Hotel in Asokoro, Abuja, with representatives from the Nigeria Customs Service, Federal Inland Revenue Service, Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation, Central Bank of Nigeria, and the FAAC Secretariat in attendance.
During the meeting, the consultant reiterated its findings, which were unanimously acknowledged by all participating agencies.
“The representatives from FIRS and NCS concurred with the consultant's position. It was determined that the consultant's findings contained in the report were indeed accurate,” stated the document.
One significant finding in the report was the erroneous classification of ₦82.04 billion (₦82,037,823,474.76) as import duty instead of import VAT. This amount was mistakenly remitted to the Federation Account rather than the VAT pool account by four commercial banks: Guaranty Trust Bank, Globus Bank, Taj Bank, and Nova Merchant Bank.
“The incorrect remittance of import VAT into the Federation Account as import levy has considerably diminished the share of sub-nationals due to the use of the vertical revenue-sharing formula instead of the VAT sharing formula,” the document explained.
In addition to the VAT misclassification, the report revealed that ₦19.13 billion (₦19,130,495,656.89) was incorrectly deposited into the federal government’s Consolidated Revenue Fund rather than the Federation Account. Out of the total ₦22.05 billion (₦22,047,725,350.91) initially believed to belong to the CRF, only ₦2.92 billion was legitimately assigned there.
“The NCS confirmed that the ₦19,130,495,656.89 was revenue for the Federation Account, which included import duties, fees, excise, and CET, while only ₦2,917,229,704.49, composed of CISS, ETLS, iron levy, port levy, and wheat grain levy, constituted CRF revenue,” the document indicated.
Together, these two misclassified amounts brought the total of wrongly allocated funds to ₦101.17 billion (₦101,168,319,131.64).
“The erroneous amounts reported were ₦82,037,823,474.76 categorized as import duty and ₦19,130,495,656.89 allocated to CRF, which cumulatively total ₦101,168,319,131.64,” the committee noted.
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