The federal government may have rescinded the imposition of 50 per cent tariff on the importation of books in April, but the policy introduced earlier in the year is still generating interest among stakeholders in the book industry, Assistant Life Editor, TERH AGBEDEH, reports
While the week-long opening ceremonies for the Port Harcourt World Book Capital City was taking place in the Rivers State capital in April, the federal government was backing down on the 50 per cent tariff it had earlier imposed on imported books.
The announcement came almost immediately after the keynote speaker at the event, Professor Wole Soyinka, had on a live television programme called on President Goodluck Jonathan to rescind the tariff policy, even before he presented the paper.
That conversation continued at this year’s edition of the Nigerian International Book Fair (NIBF), which took place from May 5 to 10 at the University of Lagos (UNILAG).
With the theme: Emergence of e-Book and the Survival of Physical Book in Africa, Dr. Victoria Okojie took the keynote paper with the same title, but the 50 per cent tariff stood out like a sore thumb. It was such that those expected to respond to the paper ended up talking about the tax and their hope that it would not resurface.
Ronke Orimolade, Board of Trustees (BoT) member of the Nigerian Book Trust (NBT), fired the first salvo, saying that the solution to the entire book impasse was the establishment of a National Book Commission.
“The book industry is having a lot of problems; bookshops are closing down,” she said.
An educated nation, she added, is judged by the number of books it published and not by the number of universities it has. Therefore, the way forward is the establishment of a National Book Commission that will embrace stakeholders as well as government functionaries and all those who have anything to do with book publishing.
Dayo Alabi, the pioneer chairman of the NBT, said the problems of the book industry were well-known to everyone, particularly after the 50 per cent tax on imported books was imposed.
“In taking any decision, you don’t just take the decision without consultation. What are the problems of printers? The key problem is that their raw materials are imported, electricity that is required for them to use is epileptic; so the production cost of printing books in Nigeria is very high compared to what it costs to produce books outside Nigeria,” he stated.
If the government wants to protect the interest of printers, he said, it is not by going against a protocol that was signed in 1952; that books all over the world should have free movement – no taxes.
Alabi, who explained that you do not solve a problem by creating another, said a lot of books used in Nigeria are not published in Nigeria.
“How many medical books are published in Nigeria? How many computer books are published in Nigeria? How many engineering books are published in Nigeria? How many educational books are published in Nigeria, outside the primary and secondary level? When you go beyond secondary school, the bulk of the books used at that level are imported. You are imposing a 50 per cent token on books and we are already complaining that people don’t read because books are expensive,” he declared.
He said it would have been better ab initio for the government to have put its cards on the table and allowed every stakeholder contribute and take an informed decision.
“It is a shame the government would take a decision without consultation, and a few weeks later, you are reversing it. That is wrong. That means no homework has been done,” he said.
He explained that a National Book Council had been set up around 2002 or 2003, of which he was a member, but the lack of continuity in government made it moribund, even before it had a chance to take root.
“That is an indication that in Nigeria there is no continuity in government. Which means things are done at the whims and caprices of those in position,” he added.
For Ayo Arogundade, the librarian of the College of Education, Ikere, Ekiti State, the way forward is to get involved in politics.
“We need the political will. Instead of us talking to the chairman, Education Committee of the House of Representatives, and the governors, I want all of us not to sit on the fence. Let us take the bull by the horns and take part in politics, join political parties. Let us be involved.
“If we have a reasonable representation in the House of Representatives, in the Senate, one of us is a governor, you will realise that instead of sending a message, we will be part and parcel, we will lobby, politick and be able to achieve most of these things,” he said.
It was heart-gladdening that the chairman of the House Committee on Education, Aminu Sulaiman, who represented the Speaker, Aminu Tambuwal, was at the gathering and had only good things to say to the book industry. For instance, he said his committee would interact with stakeholders in the book industry to see that the tax does not resurface.
“I officially extend an invitation for the association to come down to the National Assembly to liaise with the members of the committee, and as long as there is objectivity, and we believe that it is for the greater advantage of the industry, the education sector and Nigerians, I will give you my word from the bottom of my heart that we will work with you to ensure permanently that this tax does not resurface,” he said.
Federal Government of Nigeria announced a 20 per cent duty on printed books in addition to a 30 per cent levy to take effect from January 2014. This translated to a 50 per cent tariff on imported books.
The announcement was a blow to Nigerian publishers who are forced to print abroad owing to poor services in the country. Before then, in fact, many years before Independence in 1960, Nigeria signed the UNESCO convention that allows the movement of books across borders on zero per cent tariff.
The tax was as a result of amendments to the 2008-2012 Common External Tariff (As Extended), said to be part of government’s fiscal policy measures designed to encourage self-sufficiency in local industry; in other words, the printing/publishing industry.
The printing/publishing arm of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) was said to have made a strong case for increasing the duties on imported books on the ground that the necessary capacity for publishing these books in the country already exists and local printers/publishers need to be encouraged.