Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Dr Zacch Adedeji, on Monday, stated that cross-border tax crimes had undermined effort of countries to raise revenue for development.
He added that cross-border tax crimes distorted fair competition because compliant companies pay a higher cost for business and appear less profitable.
He also challenged global leaders to tackle the rising cross-border crimes that have disrupted revenue mobilisation and economic growth. Adedeji threw the challenge while delivering a keynote address at the 42nd Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crimes (CIDOEC) held at the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom.
The symposium has, for over four decades, been a crucible of ideas, a forge for strategies, and a platform where countries chart a collective course against the impact and threat economic crimes pose to countries and institutions.
The global meeting was attended by about 1,000 participants from more than 100 countries, including legislators, policy makers, law enforcement agencies, security and intelligence personnel, regulators, governance and compliance officers, and academics.
Special Adviser on Media to the FIRS boss, Dare Adekanmbi, in a statement, said Adedeji was represented by the Coordinating Director of Proceeds of Crime Management and Illicit Financial Flows and immediate past chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Professor Bolaji Owasanoye.
“This year’s theme ‘Cross-Border Crimes’ speaks directly to one of the most complex and corrosive challenges of our interconnected world. “In a global economy where capital can move faster than law enforcement, and where digital and legal arbitrage often outpace regulation, the fight against crossborder economic crime is, by necessity, both local and global, both urgent and pressing.
“Modern day cross border crimes remind us that borders and boundaries have become virtual and distance irrelevant to the perpetration of crime and the negative impact on victims,” said Adedeji, who is also the Special Adviser on Revenue to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
On corporate or natural citizens who evade, avoid, fraudulently manipulate tax obligations by exploiting the intricacies of international trade or international finance, the FIRS boss said they have become implicated in cross border crimes.
He said: “When corporate or natural persons earn income in one country but hide same in another country, when they deceive, conceal or falsify records, they undermine the integrity and fiscal aspirations of the two countries they are manipulating. “When they hide income and assets in secrecy in some jurisdictions to avoid home-country taxes, they are hurting the fiscal target of home country.”
