Last Saturday Nigeria joined 54 other member-states of the Pan African Postal Union (PAPU) to celebrate the pan African Post Day which also marked the 40th anniversary of the union established on January 18, 1980 with headquarters at Arusha, Tanzania. Pan African Post Day is used by authorities of the post in Africa to highlight the significant role which postal services play in the economic, social and cultural development of countries including PAPU’s role in promoting regional integration by developing communication facilities to ensure accessible, affordable and reliable services to the citizens in the region.
Each year, PAPU chooses a theme which focuses on its efforts to promote efficient postal and ancillary services to customers of the Post, and theme chosen for this year’s celebration is: “The Post – A Veritable Partner for Financial Inclusion and Regional Integration.” Postal services are an essential part of every country’s economic and social structure as they represent a unique asset and instrument for development. By facilitating trade at all levels and the flow of information needed to better people’s lives, the postal sector contributes to job creation and poverty alleviation which are the main goals of financial inclusion. Financial inclusion is defined as the delivery of financial services at affordable costs to sections of the disadvantaged and low income segments of the society, in contrast to financial exclusion where those services are not available or even affordable. Financial inclusion is a key enabler for boosting prosperity and reducing corruption in the society. The ‘term’ financial inclusion gained importance in the early 2000 as a result of findings about ‘financial exclusion’ and its direct correlation to poverty.
The United Nations defines the goals of Financial inclusion to include- (i) access at a reasonable cost for all households for a full range of financial services such as savings or deposit services, payment or transfer services, credit and insurance, (ii) financial and institutional sustainability to ensure continuity, and (iii) competition to ensure choice and affordability for clients. The United Nations’ (UN) data puts the number of working age adults who have no access to the types of formal financial services provided by regulated financial institutions at 3.2 billion with Sub-Saharan Africa accounting for 29% of the number of adults without a bank account. Today many postal administrations are providing a faster, more secure and reliable financial services. By adopting the UPU International Financial System, many postal administrations have been able to optimise their domestic electronic money transfer network, thus making the financial component of the world postal network an integral part of the global effort to develop economies, create jobs and reduce poverty. The UPU estimates that postal financial services will account for at least 70 billion USD of global postal revenues by the year 2020.
Interestingly, the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST) has taken giant strides in financial Inclusion through its collaboration with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). The NIPOST/CBN Financial inclusion project is a multi-agency initiative involving the Federal Ministry of Communication and Digital Economy, the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), the Infrastructure Concession and Regulatory Commission (ICRC), the Federal Ministry of Finance, CBN, and NIPOST as project owner. Its aim is to utilize the network of Post offices across the Nigeria to create and provide the citizens access to financial services, create jobs and reduce poverty in the rural areas. In March 2015, the federal government took a significant step towards improving Financial Inclusion in Nigeria with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with a Bangladeshi company, Infrastructure Investment Facilitation Company (IIFC) for the provision of advisory services to the NIPOST/CBN Financial Inclusion project.
In May 2019, NIPOST/CBN Financial Inclusion project approved the utilisation of 2000 post offices spread across the six geo-political zones of the country to serve as microfinance banks in collaboration with the Nigeria Incentive based Risk sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL) to provide credit facilities to rural farmers as part of the Federal Government’s Financial Inclusion programme. Similarly, in June last year, NIPOST signed MoU with Fidelity Bank Plc to enable the bank use more than 1800 postal outlets nationwide to expand its network and operations. It is expected that as efforts to promote a vibrant Digital economy in Nigeria, more financial institutions will seek synergies with the Postal sector to expand their reach to the populace.
There is no doubt that the posts in Africa can contribute to the impulse of sustainable development of our societies as well as fight against poverty and exclusion As PAPU celebrates its 40th Anniversary, I invite people of different social strata including Government officials to visit a Post office and find out what it has to offer. I am confident that they will find services which are better adapted to the Information society. By the same token, I am appealing to the federal government to take urgent steps to re-energize the Postal sector to enable it overcome prevailing domestic and international market forces that are challenging its relevance and viability. Replacing NIPOST’s outdated facilities and dilapidated structures will no doubt place the organization in a good stead to play a more positive role in promoting economic activities, poverty alleviation and increase of Nigeria’s gross domestic products (GDP).
By repositioning the post for better performance and integrating postal services into regional economic development goals, Governments in Africa stand a better chance of achieving a more inclusive form of development and integration.
Ejiofor is media practitioner and public affairs analyst
