33 Ministries and five Extra-Ministerial Departments (MEMDs) have completed the implementation of presidential and administrative directives to operate a fully paperless system across the Federal Civil Service, according to an announcement by Mrs. Didi Walson-Jack, Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (HCSF).
Walson-Jack made the disclosure on Wednesday during a media briefing in Abuja, describing the achievement as a major turning point in the way government business is conducted and managed within the public service.
According to her, the development marks a decisive milestone in governance, noting that the era of missing, lost, or misplaced official files has come to an end, thereby improving efficiency, accountability, and service delivery across Ministries, Departments, and Agencies.
She said, “This milestone, therefore, marks a bold transition from a paper-based legacy bureaucracy to a modern, accountable, and digitally enabled public service. Simply put, all Ministries in the Federal Civil Service are now paperless.”
The Head of Service explained that the paperless initiative has now been implemented across thirty-eight MEMDs, comprising thirty-three Ministries and five Extra-Ministerial Departments. These include the State House, the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, the Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, the Federal Civil Service Commission, and the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation.
As part of the policy’s core components, Walson-Jack highlighted a major breakthrough in official communication following the expansion of government email accounts for civil servants nationwide.
She stated, “As a key part of the paperless policy, the Federal Civil Service achieved a significant breakthrough in official communication by expanding Government Email accounts.”
Providing figures, she noted that in August 2024, fewer than 20,000 official email addresses existed for civil servants, but by Wednesday, December 31, 2025, more than 100,000 official email accounts had been created on the GovMail platform.
She said all civil servants now operate with official government email identities, which ensures secure, professional, and auditable communication across the service. According to her, this development strengthens government control over official correspondence, improves responsiveness among MDAs, and reduces dependence on unofficial communication channels.
Walson-Jack further disclosed that the adoption of GovMail is saving the Federal Government billions of naira annually by cutting down on fragmented, agency-specific external email subscriptions and licensing costs, while delivering better value for public funds.
To consolidate the gains of the paperless policy, she announced that the 38 Ministries and Extra-Ministerial Departments will no longer accept paper submissions through their physical registries.
She said, “All correspondence to the MEMDs should now be sent to the official registry email addresses, which can be found on the Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation website.”
In addition, she revealed that citizens can now track correspondence submitted to individual MEMDs through the Federal Civil Service Paperless portal, a move aimed at improving transparency and public trust.
Following the completion of these milestones, Walson-Jack said her office would expand the implementation to all Departments and Agencies, while sustaining progress through post-implementation optimisation, compliance monitoring, cybersecurity enhancement, and further digitisation of workflows.
She also disclosed plans to build the capacity of civil servants in 2026 to ensure practical, hands-on, and sustainable adoption of the new digital systems across the service.
According to her, “There will be significant capacity-building to institutionalise the ECM process throughout the Service.”
She explained that with the support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the OHCSF will launch a service-wide Training-of-Trainers programme in January 2026. The programme will train 500 trainers, who will in turn train officers across Ministries and other MEMDs.
She said the training would promote effective use of digital tools such as Service-Wise GPT, the Online Compendium of Federal Circulars, GovMail, and other digital transformation systems, ensuring officers can confidently utilise them.
Reflecting on the journey so far, Walson-Jack said the move toward a paperless Federal Civil Service has been a deliberate reform effort led by successive Heads of Service.
She recalled that in 2017, under Mrs. Winifred Oyo-Ita, the Federal Civil Service Strategy and Implementation Plan 2017–2020 was launched, formally recognising digitalisation as a reform priority.
She added that the foundation was strengthened under Dr. Folasade Yemi-Esan through FCSSIP 2021–2025, which expanded the focus to broader digital content services.
On assuming office in August 2024, Walson-Jack said only three MEMDs had achieved partial paperless operations, underscoring the scale of progress now recorded.
