The federal government has launched a new digital system designed to track and verify every kobo paid into its accounts – a move officials describe as a landmark efforts to end decades of opaque revenue collection.
The new initiative, known as the Federal Treasury Receipt (FTR), will serve as a single, standardised, and digitally verifiable proof of all payments made into federal coffers. It is being deployed alongside the Central Billing System (CBS), which harmonises the pricing and billing of government services, both forming part of the broader Revenue Optimisation and Assurance Platform (RevOp) that went live on August 1, 2025.
Wale Edun, coordinating minister of the Economy (CME) and minister of Finance, described the reform as “a new era of transparency and accountability in public finance,” noting that every government receipt will now directly correspond to funds received.
“By ensuring that every kobo due to the government is digitally tracked and fully reconciled, we are safeguarding national resources,” he said.
According to the Ministry of Finance, RevOp gives the government real-time visibility into the flow of funds from Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) through to the treasury. It also automates revenue sharing between the federal government and its agencies, reducing human interference and opportunities for diversion.
The system is undergoing a 30-day pilot across 10 federal agencies before a nationwide rollout. The government said the initiative would also lay the foundation for the National Revenue Service (NRS), expected to become operational in January 2026, to consolidate revenue collection functions currently scattered across different agencies.
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Reacting to the new initiative, Muda Yusuf, director and CEO of Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprises (CPPE), said the FTR is a way of leveraging technology to ensure transparency, minimise leakages, and eradicate corruption inherent in revenue collection.
“It’s likely to optimise revenue and fiscal consolidation. If you have this (FTR), it would reduce the tendency to borrow and improve the overall fiscal position,” Yusuf told BusinessDay in a telephone call.
Nigeria is widening its non-oil revenue based sources. Tax revenue climbed to N20.6 trillion, up 41 percent in the first eight months of 2025, beating its target of N18.32 trillion. That’s almost the entire revenue generated in the full year of 2024 at N21.7 trillion.
Despite the expansion in revenue in Africa’s top crude producer, its share as a percentage of GDP only grew to 13.5 percent in 2024. That still lags peer countries such as South Africa with 27.7 percent, Algeria with 22.9 percent, and Kenya with 18.8 percent.
The timing of the reform is crucial. With debt servicing consuming more than 60 percent of government revenue and oil receipts fluctuating, Nigeria has little fiscal room for public investment. The government hopes that plugging non-oil leakages will create additional fiscal space for education, healthcare, and infrastructure areas that have suffered chronic underfunding.
If fully implemented, the RevOp system could also improve Nigeria’s creditworthiness by enhancing transparency in public finance management, a key metric important to investors and multilateral lenders. Economists note that it could boost non-oil revenues and strengthen fiscal discipline, though it will require parallel efforts to improve tax compliance and enforcement.
“This digitisation initiative follows other revenue and fiscal reforms and is expected to promote revenue collection and assurance. We await its implementation and expect a positive impact on government revenues,” said Samuel Sule, chief executive officer of Lagos-based Renaissance Capital Africa.
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Fix for a persistent problem
Nigeria’s revenue problem has long been structural. While the country collects billions of naira in taxes, levies, and fees each year, much of it never reaches the treasury. For years, the Office of the Auditor-General and the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) have flagged discrepancies between revenues generated and what is eventually remitted.
The introduction of the Treasury Single Account (TSA) in 2015 was meant to address this, yet leakages persisted due to manual billing systems, delayed reconciliation, and weak oversight of remitting agencies. The FTR and CBS, embedded within RevOp, aim to close those gaps by digitising the entire payment chain — from service delivery to treasury confirmation, including the creation of a verifiable audit trail for every transaction.
Finance experts, however, say the real test will be in execution. “Digitisation is only as effective as its governance,” said a senior policy analyst in Abuja. “Without enforcement and regular audits, the system risks being bypassed by entrenched interests.”
Institutional challenge ahead
The creation of the National Revenue Service will be the next major test. Consolidating revenue administration under one authority promises efficiency but could trigger bureaucratic overlap and inter-agency rivalry. Success will depend on how seamlessly the FTR and CBS integrate into existing payment infrastructure such as the TSA and the Remita platform.
For the administration, the broader goal is not just efficiency but credibility. In a country where public confidence in government spending is low, a transparent and traceable payment system could help rebuild trust in fiscal governance.
Still, many will wait for proof that the reform can deliver beyond the press releases.
“The real challenge is in implementation,” said Ike Ibeabuchi, an emerging markets expert.
“If the platform can digitise the entire process, a lot of leakages can be plugged and big savings, recorded.”
