Operators task NIPOST on payment of indigenous contractors

Operators of National Mail Route Delivery Services (NMRDS) have appealed to the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST) to pay their members for services rendered before engaging a Chinese company, Speedaf Logistics Nigeria Limited, for mail delivery services in the country. Spokesperson of the operators, Senator Usman Liman, who disclosed this to newsmen in Abuja yesterday, said […]

Operators of National Mail Route Delivery Services (NMRDS) have appealed to the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST) to pay their members for services rendered before engaging a Chinese company, Speedaf Logistics Nigeria Limited, for mail delivery services in the country.

Spokesperson of the operators, Senator Usman Liman, who disclosed this to newsmen in Abuja yesterday, said NIPOST owed the operators over N200m for its services to the agency in the last eight months.

Last week, in Abuja, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, launched 27 courier service vehicles to make NIPOST and its partner, Speedaf Express, compete favourably in the industry.

However, Sen Liman said it was inappropriate for NIPOST to engage Speedaf Logistics, which is a Chinese company in mail delivery services, at the expense of indigenous companies even after it had failed to pay the local operators in the last eight months.

He stated that such action was a betrayal of confidence and a violation of the local content policy of the federal government, adding that the action would worsen the state of unemployment and increase hardship among the operators and their dependents.

The spokesperson for the operators also alleged that NIPOST had been deducting taxes from the indigenous operators in the past four to five years without remitting them to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).

He, therefore, appealed to the relevant authorities in the country to investigate the issue to avoid pushing more Nigerians into poverty.