The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) at the weekend confirmed that it shut down, Every Rose Limited, a food manufacturing company for allegedly revalidating expired curry and thyme spices.
The clampdown of the firm by the agency followed a tip-off that led the operatives to storm the main warehouse and factory of the company.
The storming of the main warehouse reportedly led to the discovery by the agency’s enforcement officers of large quantities of expired curry and thyme spices stored with the packaging materials, labels as well as stamps that were being used to illegally revalidate the already expired products.
According to the agency’s database on registered firms, 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.
A statement signed by the Resident Media Consultant to NAFDAC, Sayo Akintola, quoted the Director-General of NAFDAC, Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, as expressing her abhorrence of the act and assuring that the company would be sanctioned for endangering public health.
She confirmed that the visited two locations were sealed, adding that the company staff found revalidating the aforementioned products at the factory have 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.
The NAFDAC boss warned that there was no more hiding place for unscrupulous manufacturers and marketers who have turned themselves to merchants of death through making illicit money and by so doing, 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.
Adeyeye assured: “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.”
