Before June 2025, any business owner calculating tax obligations in Nigeria had to cross-reference at least six separate statutes with overlapping rules. Each law carried its own definitions, filing deadlines, penalty provisions, and administrative structures that frequently conflicted with one another.
A company selling goods across states could trigger the Companies Income Tax Act, the Value Added Tax Act, and the Capital Gains Tax Act on a single transaction. That fragmented framework has now been replaced entirely by a single unified code.
President Bola Tinubu signed the Nigeria Tax Act 2025 into law on June 26, 2025, creating a consolidated 203-section statute that took effect on January 1, 2026. The new code eliminated ten separate laws outright and amended provisions inside more than a dozen others.
This guide maps every repealed statute, shows where each set of provisions now lives, and explains what the transition means for you.
Ten statutes the Nigeria Tax Act wiped off the books entirely
The NTA’s preamble identifies ten standalone laws that were repealed in full and folded into the unified framework, Alliance Law Firm noted in its legal review published in June 2025.
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Self-employed tax obligations in Nigeria: what you owe and when
Each repealed law’s substantive provisions now sit inside one of the NTA’s nine chapters, preserving core rules while removing contradictions between overlapping statutes, KPMG Nigeria explained in its analysis.
Full list of old tax laws Nigeria replaced under the NTA
- Companies Income Tax Act (CITA): Corporate taxation provisions now sit under NTA Chapters Two and Three, with the standard rate at 30% for non-small companies.
- Personal Income Tax Act (PITA): Individual income tax rules moved into the NTA, with a ₦800,000 tax-free threshold and six progressive bands from 0% to 25%.
- Value Added Tax Act: VAT rules are now governed by the NTA’s dedicated consumption tax provisions, retaining the 7.5% rate while expanding zero-rating for essential goods.
- Capital Gains Tax Act: CGT provisions were absorbed into the NTA, with the rate for companies raised to 30% from the old standalone rate of 10%.
- Stamp Duties Act: Duties on instruments and transactions are now governed by the NTA’s stamp duties provisions, which modernize rules for electronic and digital dealings.
- Deep Offshore and Inland Basin Production Sharing Contracts Act: Production sharing provisions moved into the NTA’s petroleum taxation framework alongside other upstream fiscal rules.
- Industrial Development (Income Tax Relief) Act: The Pioneer Status Incentive was replaced by the Economic Development Tax Incentive, EY noted.
- Income Tax (Authorised Communications) Act: Rules on cross-border tax information sharing are now embedded within the broader NTA administrative provisions.
- Casino Act: Gaming taxation provisions are consolidated under the NTA’s corporate income tax framework, with updated compliance requirements for gaming operators.
- Venture Capital (Incentives) Act: Tax incentives for venture capital activities now sit within the NTA’s broader investment incentive framework.
Sectoral levies folded into the new 4% development levy
The NTA also absorbed several sectoral levies into a single 4% development levy on assessable company profits, replacing four overlapping charges, PwC Nigeria reported.
The replaced levies include the Tertiary Education Tax, the NITDA levy, the NASENI levy, and the Police Trust Fund levy. Under NTA Section 59, small companies and non-resident companies are fully exempt from this new consolidated obligation.
Revenue from the development levy is distributed across seven agencies under Section 59(3) of the NTA: 50% to the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, 15% to the Nigerian Education Loan Fund, and 10% to the Defence and Security Infrastructure Fund. The remaining 25% is split among NITDA at 8%, NASENI at 8%, the National Cybersecurity Fund at 5%, and the National Board for Technological Incubation at 4%, BusinessDay reported, citing the Act’s allocation framework.
Laws amended but not repealed under the new tax code
Beyond the ten full repeals, the NTA amends tax-related provisions inside more than a dozen other laws that remain active on the statute books.
Key statutes amended by the Nigeria Tax Act
- Petroleum Industry Act: Upstream profit provisions were updated to align with the NTA and its new minimum effective tax rate requirements.
- Tertiary Education Trust Fund (Establishment) Act: Funding shifted from the education tax to the development levy, but the agency continues operating independently.
- NITDA Act and NASENI Act: Both standalone levies were removed, with each agency’s share now drawn from the consolidated 4% development levy pool.
- Others amended: The Customs, Excise Tariffs Act, Nigeria Export Processing Zones Act, Oil and Gas Free Trade Zone Act, National Lottery Act, Nigerian Minerals and Mining Act, Nigeria Start-up Act, Export Incentives Act, and Cybercrime Act all had tax sections revised.
How the transition from old to new tax law works for taxpayers
The Federal Ministry of Finance released transition guidelines in June 2026 establishing how liabilities under repealed laws would be handled. Assessments, audits, and enforcement actions tied to periods before January 1, 2026 continue under the old statutes.
“This reform became necessary because the nation’s tax laws and administration had become fragmented, outdated, and highly inefficient, resulting in sub-optimal revenue generation.” — Taiwo Oyedele, now Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, in a December 2025 interview with Financial Nigeria while serving as Chairman of the Presidential Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms Committee
Tax incentives granted under repealed statutes remain valid until their original expiration dates, the guidelines confirm. New applications filed after January 1, 2026 fall exclusively under the NTA’s updated provisions and revised eligibility thresholds.
Companies with accounting periods straddling the transition date must split obligations by applying old laws for pre-2026 income and new rules afterward. The ministry described the guidelines as anchored on clarity, fairness, and administrative certainty for all affected stakeholders.
What the consolidation means for your tax compliance going forward
The overhaul reduces primary federal tax statutes from more than a dozen to four unified laws: the NTA, the Nigeria Tax Administration Act, the Nigeria Revenue Service Act, and the Joint Revenue Board Act.
Despite the simplified structure, the learning curve for interpreting provisions that differ from repealed Acts remains steep for SMEs and enforcement personnel, KPMG Nigeria warned.
For employees and individuals, the consolidated code introduced the ₦800,000 tax-free threshold, new PAYE bands, and revised capital gains treatment from January 2026. Taxpayers reconciling pre-2026 obligations can still reference repealed statutes for any historical compliance periods under review.
