A secret factory in
Onitsha, Anambra State, allegedly manufacturing substandard products has been
discovered and sealed by the Standards Organisation of Nigeria
(SON).
A team from SON had
come to the company after assessment of the company’s products showed they were
substandard.
They also arrested
the Managing Director of the company, who had tried to hide from the officials
and his Chinese accomplice.
Leading the SON team
was the Director of Operations, Mr Felix Nyado, who maintained that any company
that failed to adhere to the production standard and requirements of SON would
only be giving automatic approval to the regulatory body to stop the production
of such substandard product, stop its circulation, make seizures and destroy
such product as well as prosecute the owners of the company.
Officials of the
agency stormed Bendusco International Agency Limited, Onitsha, where products
like toothbrush, shaving stick and other items were produced. The factory by
all standards was poor by outward appearance.
Channels reports
that several workers were in the employ of the Managing Director (MD), Benjamin
Nwizu, who the workers said owed them three month’s salary.
The MD on hearing
the voices of the raid team climbed the roof space and hid himself, but his
Chinese accomplice, Ning Tiangdon, was not as lucky as he was arrested.
A thorough search
was carried out in which several other products with different brand names were
found in the factory suggestive of counterfeiting activities.
The MD was later
discovered in his hideout in the roof space and subsequently arrested.
Upon his arrest, he
denied that his company was producing fake products and said that his company
had dragged SON to court as well as to the National Assembly which he claimed
had ordered SON never to disturb or make seizures from his company.
Nwizu said: “On the
12th of this month (December), the National Assembly ordered our company and
SON with respect to disobedience of court order.
“The summons is here
with me to appear before the panel. I was there, and then the Director of Legal
Department of SON called Kawu was there. Then at the end of the day, the
National Assembly ordered them that they should not for any reason come to the
factory, or disturb the factory or arrest any of the workers and failing to do
so, that they are going to enter into trouble”.
But SON Director, Mr
Nyado maintained that National Assembly could not go against a regulatory agency
set up by the law and that SON must continue to ensure the safety of the
members of the public by carrying out their functions.
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