By Our Reporter
Infrastructure Regulatory Commission’s, ICRC, “no objection” certification granted to Société Industrielle et Commerciale de Produits Alimentaires, SICPA, as the sole company for the deployment of security stamps with a view to collect taxes through a proposed process called “track-and-trace” on manufactured and consumer goods, is unsettling Nigeria’s manufacturing and financial sectors stakeholders, AljazirahNigeria has learnt.
The stakeholders are of the view that the federal government should review its decision to engage the Swiss security ink company.
It would be recalled that government amid reforms to improve national revenue is planning to introduce value-based track-and-trace stamping of consumer and industrial products manufactured in the country.
Sources in the sectors who do not want to be named in this report among other things hinged their disapproval of the SICPA certification on the procedure adopted by the Federal Ministry of Finance and ICRC in the selection of the company for the implementation of the project.
The sources alleged that “SICPA got the approval without any competitive bidding process for the project.”
SICPA is a Swiss family-owned technology company with an international footprint, operating sites and production facilities on all continents.
The company was founded in 1927 in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Despite its long years of operation across continents, Nigerian manufacturing and financial sectors stakeholders opposed the “no objection” certification, saying the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, Switzerland, in a memo dated April 27, 2023, fined SICPA $90.6 million, “due to organisational deficiencies,” and bribery of foreign nationals where they executed contracts.
