• February 11, 2025

The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) has described as false, claims attributed to the Chairperson of the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST) Board, Hajiya Maimuna Abubakar, that both the Service and the National Assembly appropriated NIPOST’s ideas about stamp duty.

Director, Communications and Liaison Department of FIRS, Mr. Abdullahi Ismaila Ahmad, in a statement in Abuja on Tuesday said that Mrs. Abubakar’s claims made on Twitter were not true.

Ahmad stated that it was wrong for the sensitive nature of the issue at stake to be treated in that manner hence the need to correct that in order not to mislead the public.

According to him, “To be sure, NIPOST is a government parastatal (agency) established by Decree 41 of 1992 with the function to develop, promote, and provide adequate and efficiently coordinated postal services at reasonable rates.

“This function is clearly contrary to the claim by NIPOST over the administration of stamp duties in Nigeria.

“On the other hand, the FIRS is the sole agency of government charged with the responsibility of assessing, collecting, and accounting for all tax types including Stamp Duties.

“The public is hereby reminded that we at the FIRS are resolute in our resolve to safeguard national interests and not any personal ego or interest as NIPOST officials appear to carry on lately.

“We, therefore, call on right-thinking Nigerians to disregard that ill-advised twit by Mrs. Maimuna Abubakar and allied misinformation being disseminated by NIPOST in relation to Stamp Duties’ collection, which by law is the responsibility of the FIRS.”

Mrs. Abubakar had twitted amongst other things that “Under the extant laws of Nigeria to wit the NIPOST Act, the Stamp Duties Act and the Finance Act, the adhesive postage stamp is not only used for postage it is the only stamp with which denoting of ALL receipts documents and registrable instruments is to be done in Nigeria.

“The Tax Certificate or a Tax Clearance Certificate and any other formalized document issued by the FIRS whether in the form of a paper copy or an electronic copy which is printed out remains a document liable to be denoted with an adhesive postage stamp minted by NIPOST.

The Finance Act 2019 did not delete nor repeal neither did it amend Section 5(d) nor Section 34(1) and (2) of the NIPOST Act 2004.

“Section 34(2) of the NIPOST Act 2004 provides and vests in the Postmaster General of NIPOST the power to appoint or engage agents as business partners to sell by retailing the adhesive postage stamps minted by NIPOST”.

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