2404. 🇳🇿 New Zealand’s Year Of The Dragon Stamps.

 

🇳🇿 New Zealand Post -

6 December 2023 - Chinese new year, Year of the Dragon - 4 stamps, 1 miniature sheet containing all 4 stamps, 1 gold foiled miniature sheet with coloured stamps sold at the equivalent of £139.08 in a perspex stand and 1 gold foiled miniature sheet with gold stamps sold at the equivalent of £90.79 also in a perspex stand. Designed by YMC Design, Wellington and lithographed by Brebner Print and perforated 13.5. Rating:- *.

🇧🇩 Bangladesh Post 

12 November 2023 - Inauguration of Ghorashal-Polash urea fertiliser factory by Sheikh Hasina, the prime minister of Bangladesh - 1 stamp. Lithographed. Rating:- **.

2403. 🇱🇰 Sri Lanka Commemorates Deepavali.

 

New issues.

🇱🇰 Sri Lanka Post -

12 November 2023 - Deepavali, Hindu religious festival - 1 stamp. Lithographed. Rating;- ****. 

🇮🇲 Isle Of Man Post Office -

4 January 2024 - Bicentenary of the Royal National Lifeboat Institute - 6 stamps (see Blog 2401) and a Prestige booklet costing ££21.10p with an accompanying booklet pane made up of all 6 stamps. DesRNLI and Isle Of Man Advertising and lithographed by bpost and perforated 11.5.

🇮🇳 India Post -

 

My Stamps (personalised stamps sold in sheetlets of 12 with attached labels at a premium price) -

2023 - Centenary of the Karnatika Administrative Service Officers’ Association - 1 stamp.

🇲🇻  Maldives Post -

18 November 2023 - Inauguration of new President, Mohamed Muizzu. 

  A presidential election was held on 9 and 30 September 2023 and Muizzu defeated the sitting president Ibrahim Mohamed Solih. Muizzu had been a supporter of the previous president, Abdulla Yameen who had been imprisoned for corruption and money laundering. Muizzu had been calling for the release of Yameen and indeed released him to house arrest on his inauguration as president. It is notable that during the presidency of Yameen, Stamperija, the notorious producers and purveyors of paraphilatelic products, had been allowed to issue thousands of ‘stamps’, generally irrelevant in subject matter to Maldives, by right of a contract it held with what was proven to be a corrupt Maldivian government. After the assumption of power by Ibrahim Solih, the release of paraphilatelic products in Maldives’ name by Stamperija was ended and Maldives Post has issued barely any stamps since the ending of its contract with Stamperija.

  Collectors may now be alarmed at the prospect that a new administration has been formed by a strong supporter of the corrupt previous president, Yameen, and may be anxious that Stamperija may once more be awarded a contract by this new regime and allowed to once more flood the market with products with the name of Maldives printed on them. Let us hope not.

Maldives Post tweeted its congratulations to Muizzu and his vice president on 17 November 2023.:-

2402. 🇲🇹 Malta’s Christmas Stamps.

 

New issues.

🇲🇹 MaltaPost -

21 November 2023 - Christmas - 3 stamps. Designed by MaltaPost and lithographed by Printex and perforated 14. Rating:- ***.

🇲🇼 Malawi Post -

2023. The government of Malawi, a country whose economy could justifiably be said to be in dire straits, devalued the national currency, the Kwacha, on 10 November 2023 by 44%. It is reasonable to assume that this may lead to postal rate changes with resulting new surcharged stamps to address the new rates. Collectors may wish to remain alert to the possibility of such new stamps coming on to the market. New Malawi stamp issues have only been released in the form of surcharged former definitives since 2018.

Previous surcharges - 

🇱🇹 Stamperija (exploitative Lithuania-based producer and purveyor of paraphilatelic items under contract from various postal administrations). The number of these products is far in excess of postal need and it is highly unlikely that they are actually released in most or all the countries whose names appear on the products. While many feature subjects which are wholly irrelevant to these countries, some products have been sold recently which have a semblance of normality and appear to be the sort of products which might be sold by the postal services in post offices. There is presently no evidence to suggest that such products are actually sold in these countries and I view them as items cleverly and selectively produced to convey the impression that they are normal, postally usable postage stamps. These new products are issued in multiple expensive versions - miniature sheets, sheetlets, imperforate and perforated and so on. As always, caveat emptor. Such items are rated ‘0’.

🇸🇱 Products inscribed Sierra Leone -

2023 - Inauguration of Pan-African Postal Union (PAPU) Headquarters, Arusha in Tanzania - 4 stamps and 7 miniature sheets.

2023 - World Post Day, 2023 - 1 stamp issued in a sheetlet of 8 and 1 single stamp miniature sheet.

2401. 🇮🇲 Isle Of Man RNLI And Chinese New Year Stamps In 2024.

 

New issues -

🇮🇲 Isle Of Man Post Office-

4 January 2024 - Bicentenary of the Royal National Lifeboat Institute - 6 stamps. Lithographed. Rating:- ****.

22 January 2024 - Chinese New Year, Year of the Dragon - 4 stamps. Designed by Jo Davies and lithographed. Rating:- *.

🇸🇬 Singapore Post -

22 November 2023 - Horoscope symbols, third issue - 4 stamps and 1 ‘Collectors sheet’ containing 12 stamps. Designed by Lim An-ling and lithographed by Brebner Print and perforated 14. Rating:- **.

2400.🇬🇧 Royal Mail Marks King’s 75th Birthday With Coin Cover And “Specially Issued £5 Stamp”.

 

🇬🇧 Royal Mail -

14 November 2023 - 75th Birthday of King Charles III - 1 Commemorative ‘coin cover’ described on Royal Mail Shop’s internet page as being made up of “A brilliant uncirculated £5 coin celebrating the 75th birthday of His Majesty King Charles III. Presented with a specially issued [my italics - WK] £5 stamp. Limited edition of just 10,000”.

 

It will be interesting to see what “specially issued” means given that the illustration of the £5 stamp on the   Royal Mail internet site looks exactly like the ordinary £5 King Charles definitive stamp issued on 29 August 2023. The term, ‘specially issued’, suggests that the stamp was issued especially for use on this cover and that there is something different about it from the 29 August-issued stamp. I suspect it will prove to be the same stamp though, who knows?, there may be some odd feature about it, not seen on the ordinary counter sheet stamp.

  These coin covers seem to be popular though how many of the covers containing the gold proof version of the coin will be sold at a price of £2,995 each is an interesting question. Anyone feeling sorry for the failing Royal Mail postal service (post is delivered to my house about three times per week), recently fined £5 million for its poor service, may wish to help out the organisation by buying a brace of the gold coin covers or, alternatively, perhaps they may prefer to put aside their cash for next year’s Royal Mail deluge of new ‘special’ issues featuring the trite, the trivial and the irrelevant, as has been the custom in recent years.

In the meantime, Happy birthday, Your Majesty!

2399. 🇮🇪 Ireland Commemorates Notable Architect.

 

New issues.

🇮🇪 An Post (postal service of the Republic of Jreland) -

8 November 2023 - Bicentenary of the death of James Gandon, London-born architect of notable Dublin and Irish buildings - 2 self-adhesive, vertically se-tenant stamps produced in sheetlets of 8. Designed by Design HQ from illustrations by Dorothy Smith and lithographed by Enschedé. Rating:- ***.

🇮🇳 India Post -

7 November 2023 - Platinum jubilee of Raman Research Institute, Bengaluru - 1 stamp. Rating:- **.

🇭🇰 Hong Kong Post -

23 November 2023 - Development of railway services in Hong Kong - 6 stamps and 2 miniature sheets each containing a single stamp. Lithographed. Rating:- **.