CORPORATE GOVERNANCE AND TAX PLANNING IN NIGERIA

ABSTRACT

This study investigated the relationship between corporate governance and tax planning of listed firms in Nigeria. While the study specifically examined, the effect of board size on the effect of tax planning; determine the effect of board gender diversity on the effect of tax planning; investigate the effect of board independence on the effect of tax planning; and establish the effect of board compensation on the effect of tax planning on listed firms in Nigeria. To achieve the stated objectives, the study will adopt a quantitative research design. The population for this study comprises all the 97 non-financial and non-oil and gas firms listed on the Nigerian Exchange Group (NGX) as at 31st December, 2022. The sample size for this study is 78 firms obtained from the Yamane’s (1967) formula; the study employed panel data, which allows the pooling of observations of successive cross- sectional data. This found that, board size has a negative and significant relationship with effective tax, board gender diversity policy has a positive and significant relationship with effective tax planning, board independence policy has a negative and significant relationship with tax planning; and board composition has a negative but insignificant relationship with tax planning. The study therefore made the following recommendations: studies should be carried out on the relationship between corporate governance and tax planning in Nigeria by considering other sectors such as banking, oil and gas sectors; studies should be carried out using other methods of data analyses such as panel least square; and there should be across boarder studies in this direction to see if countries specifics will have effects on results outcome.