The last may not have been of a businessman currently held in custody over possession of fake drugs which he, in connivance of others, repackaged and sold to the public.
Already, a drug store operator in Okokomaiko (names withheld) is seeking the protection of law enforcement agents from some of his customers who are allegedly threatening to kill him for selling fake drugs to them.
It was gathered that two of the children of the consumers are currently ill in a private hospital at Iba area of the state after being administered with the drugs.
Ibeabuchi, an eight-year-old girl, is reported to be hospitalised following a drug her father purchased from the shop of the drug dealer and the same fate now befalls one Abigael, a 10-yearold girl.
Madu Abuzu, a Lagos State-based businessman, is already in the dragnet of National Agency Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), over allegation that he clones drugs and resells to innocent Nigerians. It is reported that Abuzu did not perfect his drug counterfeiting here in Nigeria, but in China with some native collaborators in the Asian nation.
Abuzu owns a warehouse at No 21, Ashogbon Street, on Lagos Island where he reportedly stores and re-sells the repackaged drugs. For two years now, it was gathered that officials of NAFDAC had been on the trail of the fake drug syndicate.
The drug store operator claimed that he purchased his drugs from Abuzu and that he should be the one to be harassed instead of him. While drug counterfeiting agents were on Abuzu’s trail, there was constant touch with their Chinese counterparts, to assist in unveiling Abuzu’s cohorts in China and with agreements reached that once they were apprehended, the Chinese collaborators would also face similar punishment back home.
NAFDAC officials claim that Abuzu specializes in counterfeiting drugs like Coartem tablets, packaging materials and labels , Ibupkris, Amalar, unlabelled tablets, Maloxine tablets, packaging materials and leaflets, sealing hand machines, Richy Gold Int’l Ibuprofen among other malaria and catarrh drugs. After a long wait and close monitoring, Abuzu was recently arrested in his apartment at No 9, Alhaji Hassana Street, Orile Iganmu, Lagos.
It was reported that at the time of his arrest, a fake drug valued at over N20 million were found in his apartment. It was reported that initially, Abuzu wanted to feign ignorance of the allegations levelled against him, but gave in when he was confronted with overwhelming evidence of his culpability in the crime.
Speaking to reporters of Abuzu’s arrest, NAFDAC’s Director of Enforcement, Mr Garba Macdonald, had said that had he not been arrested, Abuzu would have succeeded in poisoning a lot of innocent Nigerian children particularly. Narrating the events that led to Abuzu’s arrest, McDonald says, “The arrest of Maduabuchi is a major breakthrough in the fight to stem activities of the syndicate who had in the last two years brought into the country fake drugs with its partners in China.
The agency is leaving no stone unturned in apprehending those still at large and are behind this scam,” McDonald said. NAFDAC said that eventually, Abuzu confessed to his crime saying he imported the drug from China through his contacts in the Asian nation.
The agency added that that through intelligence gathering, “It was established that the suspect used his house as a warehouse where the alleged cloned drugs are stored.”
McDonald had maintained that Abudu is already cooperating with the agency to get to the root of the matter with a view to apprehending his partners-in-crime. He used the opportunity to advise Nigerians to report without delay, to the agency, any act that relates to its regulated products seen to be suspect of its genuineness.
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