By Okon Okon, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
On December 31, 2025, Nigeria’s Federal Civil Service achieved a landmark transformation: all 33 federal ministries and five extra-ministerial departments officially transitioned to fully paperless operations. This was not merely an IT upgrade but a deliberate, systemic rupture from a decades-old culture of manual bureaucracy, symbolised by the issuance of over 100,000 secure GovMail accounts to civil servants nationwide.
This initiative, known as the 1Government (1Gov) Paperless Initiative, replaces physical filing cabinets and paper trails with a unified digital ecosystem. At its core are two critical platforms: the sovereign 1Government Cloud and an Enterprise Content Management System (ECM), both deployed by Galaxy Backbone, the government’s IT agency. These systems enable digital document storage, secure communication, automated workflows for approvals, and virtual collaboration—all hosted within Nigeria’s borders to ensure data sovereignty and security.
The Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Mrs. Didi Walson-Jack, declared this a “bold departure” from legacy systems. The journey, however, began years earlier. The foundational push was the Federal Civil Service Strategy and Implementation Plan (FCSSIP) 2017–2020, which introduced the ECM. Successive leadership, under Dr. Folasade Yemi-Esan and now Walson-Jack, expanded this into the FCSSIP 2021–2025, creating a comprehensive digital services framework. When Walson-Jack assumed office in August 2024, only three ministries were partially paperless; by the 2025 deadline, all 38 key government offices had transitioned.
The Tangible Benefits: Beyond Saving Paper
The value of this shift extends far beyond environmental savings. Research from digital government reforms in countries like Estonia, Rwanda, and Singapore provides a clear blueprint of benefits Nigeria now stands to gain:
- Radical Efficiency: Automated workflows drastically reduce document processing times—from weeks to days or even hours—minimising the notorious delays caused by physical file movement and “missing” documents.
- Enhanced Transparency & Accountability: Every action on a digital document—creation, editing, approval—is time-stamped and user-audited. This creates an immutable audit trail, reducing opportunities for discretionary opacity and improving institutional memory.
- Cost Savings: The consolidation to over 100,000 GovMail accounts alone has saved “billions of naira” previously spent on fragmented, insecure external email services. Long-term savings will accrue from reduced spending on paper, printing, storage, and courier services.
- Citizen-Centric Service Delivery: Citizens and businesses can now submit correspondence via scanned letters to official registry emails and track them through a dedicated portal, promising faster response times and an end to lost applications.
Confronting the Inevitable Challenges
As global studies and local observers note, the path to a fully digital civil service is fraught with hurdles. The article rightly highlights persistent concerns:
- Cybersecurity & Data Integrity: A centralized digital government becomes a high-value target. Sovereign hosting is a first step, but it must be backed by relentless investment in advanced threat detection, encryption, and robust data backup protocols to prevent catastrophic breaches.
- The Digital Divide & Infrastructure Gaps: Unstable power supply and unreliable internet connectivity, especially in remote regions, threaten to create a two-tier system where digital efficiency is uneven. This could exacerbate existing inequalities in access to public services.
- Human Capacity & Change Management: The most significant resistance often comes from within. Civil servants accustomed to paper-based routines may experience anxiety and skill gaps. As Mrs. Alice Ukpana, a civil servant, noted, sustained, empathetic training is non-negotiable. The planned UNDP-supported Training-of-Trainers programme for 500 officers is a critical step in this cascade model.
The Road Ahead: Institutionalising the Digital Culture
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Sen. George Akume, aptly framed the shift as a fundamental change in “culture, mindset and service delivery.” Technology is merely the enabler. The true test lies in institutionalising these processes so they outlive individual administrators.
Walson-Jack’s office has outlined a forward-looking agenda: post-implementation optimisation, strict compliance monitoring, and further digitisation of legacy workflows. The mandate that ministries will no longer accept physical paper submissions is a powerful enforcement mechanism.
Conclusion: A Defining Moment for Nigerian Governance
As analyst Mr. Luke Ekere observed, this initiative is transformative, altering the very interface between the state and the citizen. If supported by continuous leadership commitment, targeted capacity building, and robust infrastructure investment, Nigeria’s paperless milestone could indeed mark a turning point. It moves the country beyond competing on paper to competing in the global digital age, offering a blueprint for a more efficient, transparent, and accountable public service. The stacks of paper are gone; the real work of building a resilient digital governance culture has just begun.
***If used, please credit the writer and the News Agency of Nigeria.
