The Area Postal Manager of the Nigerian Postal Service (NPS) Ogun Territory, Mrs Toyin Egbesola yesterday, said with concerted efforts the revenue from stamp duty could surpass that being generated by the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) for Nigeria.
Egbesola who spoke on the heels of the celebration of the World Postal Day yesterday, asserted that such efforts should be from both governments and the people, “as we as a body are ready to spread the message of stamp duties adoption in the country.”
Egbesola added, “If we can go back to history and make using of stamp duty as acceptable confirmation of payment on every transaction, we can surpass what Customs is actually generating and this can go a long way in getting the country out of the present economic recession.”
The area postal manager said NIPOST was having challenge in the enforcement of the stamp duty law. “Only few states have keyed into it. Some of the states are Lagos, Benue and others in the South East. The compliance is poor in the South West,” she said.
Meanwhile, a varsity don has asserted that Nigeria has lost huge sums as a result of stamp duty non-compliance in various sectors.
A lecturer with the National Open University (NOU) Bauchi Study Centre, Professor Ahmed Sale Gidado said at the commemoration of the 2016 World Post Day at the Bauchi NIPOST office yesterday that non-compliance to the stamp duty by government and private establishments over the years had meant massive losses of revenue that could have gone to the government.
“In the banking sector, government lost about N2 trillion to the same non-implementation of the Stamp Duty Act in the last four years,” he said, adding that in the aviation sector, about N5 billion had been lost or unaccounted for in the last four years.
“The transportation sector and ports authority are equally considered to be among the worst culprits in the stamp duty implementation default. It was estimated that about N2 trillion had been lost in the last three years in this sector,” he added.
