As part of the ways to tackle the menace of Tax Havens on the economies of developing countries, the Former Director of Distance Learning Centre (DLC), University of Ibadan, Professor Bayo Okunade has suggested that researchers should take Tax Havens as an area of research interest.

Prof Okunade gave this recommendation while he was delivering his keynote address at an International Conference organised by the Centre for General Studies and the Office of International Programme, University of Ibadan on the topic 'Tax Havens and the Developing World: A Global Dimension’.

The former UI DLC Boss noted that until the exposure of the Panama Papers which revealed the list of wealthy people who had secret offshore accounts, the problems of Tax Havens received little or no attention from researchers and scholars.   

Prof Okunade explained that Tax Havens are countries that legally admit individuals to keep their assets, wealth and resources with an assurance of secrecy and anonymity. He also noted that Tax Havens are jurisdictions that use secrecy as a prime tool to lure wealthy people into keeping their money with little or no tax demands.

Enumerating the injurious effects of Tax Havens on developing economies, Prof Okunade explained that the practice of having secret offshore accounts encourages tax evasion and allow people remain unaccountable to their actions.

He also noted that Tax Havens deprive poor countries the resources to fight poverty and stunt the social and political potentials of developing countries. Acccording to the Professor of Political Science “African countries have lost over 1 trillion in capital flight to Tax Havens which impoverishes the developing countries.”

Professor Okunade therefore encouraged the academic community to conduct more researches into unravelling the dangers of Tax Havens so as to tackle its effects. “Researchers should take Tax Havens as an area of research interest because have a responsibility of stopping this phenomenon,” he said.