NAFDAC raids 15 supermarkets, closes one, confiscates expired goods

The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC)has raided 15 supermarkets in Minna, sealing one and confiscating many expired commodities.

Mr. Shaba Mohammed, Director, North Central, disclosed this on Thursday during the exercise in Minna.

“We are here to conduct some raids on some supermarkets in Minna.

“So far, we have covered 15 supermarkets in Minna. All in all, we discovered violative items that have been evacuated.

“We also discovered unregistered products and others that have expired with the dates changed,” he said.

Mohammed explained that some of the items included tea, baked beans, beverages, and other food consumables.

“There was one particular supermarket with very poor hygiene and poor warehousing, to the extent that they were storing some of their products in the toilet.

“We had no alternative but to evacuate everything, and the supermarket was sealed,” he said.

He said that the owner of the sealed supermarket and other suspects were invited to Abuja and Kaduna for further investigation.

The director said that the products confiscated would be taken to the laboratory for detailed analysis to enable it to prosecute the suspects accordingly.

He said that the violators would be made to pay fines or face prosecution, and the products would be destroyed to protect public health.

Mohammed advised the public to always read the label on any products they purchased to verify the NAFDAC registration number and expiration date because some of them could be cleaned and reprinted.

Also, Mr. James Kigbu, the State Coordinator of NAFDAC, said that the agency was on routine exercise to protect public health.

“This is part of our activities to carry out regulatory functions,” he said.

It was observed during the raid that some of the supermarkets packed items meant for sale to unsuspecting members of the public on the floor of dirty warehouses infested with rodents that could endanger public health instead of packing them on pallets for protection.

The North Central zone of the agency comprises Niger, Nasarawa, Kogi, Benue and Plateau states.