Tinubu nominates Oyedele as Minister of State for Finance

President Bola Tinubu has nominated Taiwo Oyedele as the Minister of State for Finance. Presidential spokesman Bayo Onanuga, in a statement on Tuesday, said the former chairman of the Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms will replace Doris Uzoka-Anite. “President Tinubu has today conveyed the nomination of Oyedele to the Senate for confirmation […]

President Bola Tinubu has nominated Taiwo Oyedele as the Minister of State for Finance.

Presidential spokesman Bayo Onanuga, in a statement on Tuesday, said the former chairman of the Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms will replace Doris Uzoka-Anite.

“President Tinubu has today conveyed the nomination of Oyedele to the Senate for confirmation in a letter to the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio,” Onanuga said.

Uzoka-Anite will now move to the Ministry of Budget and National Planning, as the Minister of State, her third portfolio in the administration, the presidential spokesman added.

Tinubu nominated Uzoka-Anite as Minister of Industry, Trade, and Investment in August 2023. But in November 2024, she was redeployed to serve as Minister of State for Finance.

In July 2023, Tinubu appointed Oyedele, a fiscal policy partner and Africa tax leader at PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC), to chair the tax reforms committee.

The 50-year-old Oyedele is a public policy expert, an accountant, and an economist.

He attended Yaba College of Technology and bagged a Higher National Diploma (HND) in accountancy and finance.

Oyedele also earned a BSc in applied accounting from Oxford Brookes University.

He also studied at the London School of Economics, Yale University, the Gordon Institute of Business Science, and the Harvard Kennedy School, where he completed executive education programmes.

The ministerial nominee worked for decades with PWC, having started his career at the organisation in 2001. He is also a visiting scholar at the Lagos Business School.

His appointment came months after Tinubu assented to the tax laws masterminded by Oyedele and his team.

The four bills: the Nigeria Tax Bill, the Nigeria Tax Administration Bill, the Nigeria Revenue Service (Establishment) Bill, and the Joint Revenue Board (Establishment) Bill were passed by the National Assembly last year after months of extensive debates and controversies.

On June 25, 2025, President Tinubu assented to the bills despite pushback and criticisms from opposition figures and pressure groups.

The new tax laws took effect on January 1, 2026, marking a shift in the country’s tax regime.

What Oyedele’s appointment means

The appointment of Oyedele comes amid speculation that Doris Uzoka Anite was expected to succeed Wale Edun as Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy.

It would be recalled that, in what many view as a demotion, Edun was stripped of key powers, as important agencies previously under his supervision were reassigned to his junior colleague, Anite.

Edun’s apparent falling out with President Tinubu has been linked to his public statements acknowledging financial discrepancies in Nigeria’s budget and revenue projections, which contrasted with the official narrative of the presidency.

Notably, Edun admitted that the federal government would likely miss the 2025 revenue target of N30 trillion and highlighted gaps between proposed budget allocations and actual funding realities.

In December 2025, several key agencies, including all revenue-collection bodies under the Ministry of Finance, were transferred to the office of the Minister of State for Finance. This includes the Nigerian Revenue Service (NRS), formerly the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).

Consequently, Oyedele, who spearheaded the government’s tax reforms that created the NRS, will now directly supervise the agency in his role as Minister of State, pending clearance by the Nigerian Senate.

There are also indications that Oyedele could be favoured as the substantive Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy if President Tinubu secures a second term.

Industry experts, however, have ruled out Edun’s return, noting that he appears to have fallen out of favour with the presidency and may only serve until the administration’s tenure ends in 2027.