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.
The company has been sealed, the MD and his Chinese accomplice handed over to police.
