Nigerian Postal Service
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| Nigerian Postal Service | |
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| Type | State-owned (government monopoly) |
| Founded | Nigeria (1987) |
| Headquarters | Nigeria |
| Key people | Mallam Ibrahim Mori Baba PMG/CEO |
| Industry | Postal Services |
| Products | First Class mail, Domestic Mail, Logistics |
| Revenue | unknown |
| Website | Official Website |
The Nigerian Postal Service, abbreviated as Nipost, is a government-owned and operated corporation postal authority responsible for providing postal services in Nigeria. It has more than 20,000 employees and runs more than 5,000 post offices. The Nigerian Postal Service also have the following Business Ventures, EMS, Bulk Post Venture, NIPOST Central Workshop, Philatelic Services, Courier Regulatory Services, Parcel Post Venture and Nipost PostCash.
[edit] History
The history of the Post in Nigeria dates back to 19th century. The first post office was established by the British Colonial Masters]] in 1851. It was considered to be a part of the British postal system. It was a branch of London General Post Office and this was the situation till 1874.
The Royal Niger Company (RNC) which was actively involved in economic activities in the country, set up its own postal system in Akassa in 1887, Calabar in 1891, Burutu in 1897 and Lokoja in 1899. Mail were being moved from these trading stations to and from Lagos by a weekly mail boat.
In 1898, the British Post Office established post offices at Badagary, Epe, Ikorodu, Ijebu-Ode, Ibadan and Abeokuta.
In 1892, the Royal Niger Company became a member of the Universal Postal Union.[citation needed] By 1908, Money orders and mail were exchanged directly with the German West African Colonies instead of via London, as previously. In 1925, Royal Airforce planes flew from Kano to Cairo carrying mail for the first time outside the country.
From January 1, 1900, the Southern Nigeria Government took over the responsibility of running the postal system in the entire country. There were not many good road at the time, so mail was most often conveyed by canoes, launchers and runners which could only operate at intervals of two weeks or less. The first post office in Northern Nigeria was established in Lokoja in 1899.
While mail delivery was initially the business focus, British Postal orders were being sold and encashed from 1907 in post offices located at headquarters of all District Commissioners. Internal airmail flights started in 1931. By 1906, 27 Post Offices were operating and at the time of independence in 1960, 176 Post Offices, 10 sub Post offices and 1,000 Postal agencies were in the country.
At independence, the post was administered jointly with Telecommunications as a government department. Later, postal establishments and services grew significantly. The Federal Government by Decree No. 22 of 1966 made the department a quasi-commercial organisation a step towards making it more efficient and responsive to public needs. The Nigeria Postal service Department came into being with the establishment of the Nigeria Telecommunications Limited(NITEL) on January 1, 1985. NITEL emerged from the merger of the Telecommunications arm of the defunct Post and Telecommunications department of the Ministry of Communications with the former Nigeria External Telecommunications Limited (NET). Through the promulgation of decree No. 18 of 1987, NIPOST became an extra-ministerial department.
