The Federal Government has granted rice and palm oil import waivers amounting to about N150 billion this year to 10 companies, with one of them securing the duty write offs 164 times since February, documents obtained by Daily Trust have shown.Duty is a tax levied on imports by the customs authorities to generate revenue and to protect domestic industries from more efficient or predatory competitors from abroad. The Federal Government has been waiving such duties to well-connected businessmen and political loyalists, thereby leading to loss of billions in revenue that could have accrued to public coffers.According to government documents obtained exclusively by Daily Trust, from January to October this year, the Federal Government waived import duties, levies and other taxes associated with the importation of rice and palm oil to over 100 private companies, out of which 10 companies alone got N150 billion waivers.A company named Connotation Concepts Limited, which registered its nature of business as 'bookshops and stationery stores', secured duty waivers to import refined palm oil worth billions of naira over a period of 10 months during the year, the documents show.On June 1, Connotations got four waivers to import palm oil amounting to N233 million, N233 million, N21 million and N67.4 million. Also, on June 10, the government approved for the same company imports of palm oil worth N337 million, N136 million, N114 million, N141 million and N110 million. Four days later, it secured another four separate import approvals totalling N1.3 billion. On July 27, it was granted seven import permission totalling N1.2 billion. All these came with waivers of taxes.Checks at the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) showed that Connotations was registered on September 25, 2006, with address at Block 8, New Mammy Road, Nyanya, Abuja, to undertake business of 'bookshop and stationery stores.' It has Kumdet Nambut and Olutola Olaitan as directors, with a share capital of N100,000.Another company, Energy Resources Management Limited got rice import waiver approvals 34 times between February and July, thereby saving taxes amounting to N5.6 billion. In July, the company secured waivers to import rice worth N1.45 billion naira, N46 million, N104.8 million and N92.1 million at different times, costing the government millions of naira in taxes. In July alone, the same company got tax reliefs worth N469 million.CAC documents show that Energy Resources was registered on June 18, 1999, with a share capital of N1 million, with address at 47/57, Martina Street, Lagos. Its directors are Jide Omokore and Richard Idowu.Another company, Network Supplies Limited, got rice import duty waivers 36 times during the year, leading the Federal Government to lose about N5billion in taxes.Also on the list of firms that benefited from the rice or palm oil waivers are Olam Nigeria Limited, Presco Industries Limited and Sopon Nigeria Limited.Speaker Aminu Waziri Tambuwal of the House of Representatives recently said incessant grant of waivers by the Federal Government was killing the Nigerian economy and must be stopped. He said: 'I call on the executive to stop granting waivers because according to reports the Federal Government has been granting a lot of waivers to some companies. We have to review our waiver granting policy. We have too much budget deficits, how do we bridge this gap while you are busy granting waivers
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