The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has shut down a food manufacturing company for allegedly revalidating expired curry and thyme spices.
Following a tip-off, operatives of the Investigation and Enforcement Directorate of NAFDAC stormed the main warehouse and factory of Every Rose Limited, manufacturers of SomGeo brand of spices.
The visit allegedly led to the discovery that large quantities of expired curry and thyme spices were stored in the warehouse with packaging materials, labels as well as stamps that were being used to illegally revalidate the already expired products.
Records available in NAFDAC showed that the company registered 16 different products for listing under the brand name SOMGEO, including SOMGEO Ginger Powder, SOMGEO Garlic Powder, SOMGEO Thyme Leaves and SOMGEO Mixed Spices Powder. The registration, however, expired on December 5, 2017.
In a statement signed by the Resident Media Consultant to NAFDAC, Sayo Akintola, on Sunday, Feb 7, the Director-General of NAFDAC, Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, expressed her abhorrence of the act and disclosed that the company would be heavily sanctioned for endangering public health.
Adeyeye said the two locations visited were sealed and placed on hold, adding that the company staff found revalidating the aforementioned products at the factory had been apprehended and taken to NAFDAC Investigation and Enforcement office for further investigation.
The statement added that different products and work tools were found in the factory, while the business owner is at large.
Adeyeye warned that there was no more hiding place for unscrupulous manufacturers and marketers who had turned themselves to merchants of death to making illicit money by sending unsuspecting Nigerian consumers to their early graves through production and sale of falsified and revalidated expired products.
She said the agency would stop at nothing to track down the illicit merchants wherever they are within the country.
“We are ready to eliminate the incidence of falsified products in our markets or bring it down to the minimum to safeguard the health of our people,” she said.
