PENGASSAN rejects plan to tax pension, terminal benefits

 

    The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, PENGASSAN, has rejected the plan by the federal and state governments to impose tax on pensions, gratuities and terminal benefits of workers in the country.

    The senior staff trade union vowed to resist the implementation of the plan which it claimed was to further impoverish Nigerian workers, who served the country.

    In a communiqué issued at the end of its National Executive Council meeting in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, PENGASSAN condemned what it called a unilateral decision by the Federal Inland Revenue Service and States Internal Revenue Service to act outside the provisions of the federal tax laws, thereby infringing on the rights of the workers.

  The communiqué, signed by the PENGASSAN President, Francis Johnson, and the General Secretary, Lumumba Okugbawa, condemned the plan by governments, especially the Lagos State Inland Revenue Service.

  The oil workers association also condemned the actions of the Joint Tax Board and some state boards of internal revenue for illegally harassing employers from processing additional pension and life insurance tax reliefs by workers as enshrined in the law.