BY BRIGHT JACOB
Legal fireworks may soon commence between the National Mail Route Delivery Service and the Nigeria Postal Service over an alleged N200 million debt owed members of NMRDS in the last eight months.
The operators had in a petition signed by it’s lawyer, Wole Abidakun, urged the Minister of Communication and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, to compel NIPOST to offset the debts within the next seven days or face legal battle in court.
In the petition, Abidakun claimed that the operators couldn’t bid for other jobs in other organisations because the tax deductions effected on operators’ account for the past five years by NIPOST have not been remitted to the Federal Inland Revenue Service.
This, he noted, had prevented the operators from accessing their tax clearance over the years, and has subsequently brought untold hardship on the members of NMRDS.
The petition, which was also copied to the Postmaster General of NIPOST, Ismail Adewusi, said, “Ordinarily, our clients would have proceeded to explore other legal options available to them, but to show goodwill, our clients demand a meeting with you within seven days of your receipt of this letter to sort out issues amicably and maintain the cordial relationship that exists between your organisation and our clients.”
Continuing, it said, “Where you fail, refuse, and/or neglect to meet our clients, within the time herein stated, then we have our client’s further instructions to explore legal remedies available to them.”
Also, the operators, through it’s spokesman Usman Liman, brought attention to a company, Speedaf Logistics, a Chinese company, hired by NIPOST for mail delivery services, when it (NIPOST) failed to pay the operators in the last eight months, and when there were indigenous ones that could do the same job.
