The Nigerian Postal Service said on Wednesday the newly passed Postal Bill will revolutionalise the postal system and bring postal industry in line with international best practices.
Franklin Alao, NIPOST’s General Manager, Corporate Communication, said the bill is not an amendment as was wrongly presented in some media reports, explaining that a section of the media portrayed the new Bill as an amendment.
“It is a new bill which replaces the repealed NIPOST Act, Cap. N127, LFN 2004. The bill designates NIPOST as a postal operator and principally establishes Nigerian Postal Commission as the regulator of the country’s postal industry.”
He said the provision of the new bill relating to denotation of document and instruments have nothing to do with dutiable items under the Stamp Duty Act.
He stated, “The report quoting Clause 13 sub-clause 1(one) failed to go to number 2 of the said clause that limits NIPOST to “transactions that are not dutiable or not subject to duty.”
He explained further that NIPOST’s powers under Stamp Duties Act as amended by Section 46 of the 2020 Finance Act remains the use of adhesive stamps produced by NIPOST for denotation of fee or duty.
The General Manager noted, “The new Bill passed is to bring NIPOST into international best practices by separating NIPOST as an operator from being at the same time, a regulator.
“The regulatory power of the entire postal industry has been vested in the newly created Nigerian Postal Commission.”
He disclosed that the new bill would also afford NIPOST the avenue to go into other services such as financial services, establish or incorporate subsidiaries or affiliated companies.
