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NAFDAC arraigns firm’s MD over fake products

By Joseph Onyekwere
03 November 2017   |   4:09 am
The National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), yesterday arraigned the Managing Director of Tasty Time Nigeria Limited, Mr. Isaac Kole, at a Federal High Court, Lagos.

High Court

The National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), yesterday arraigned the Managing Director of Tasty Time Nigeria Limited, Mr. Isaac Kole, at a Federal High Court, Lagos.

Kole was arraigned before Justice Hadiza Rabiu-Shagari alongside his company on a four-count charge of producing fake products.

NAFDAC alleged that Kole has been using his firm located at 1, Kole Street, Ipaja, Lagos, to produce unregistered Tasty Time products. The alleged fake products include: Tasty Time juice, Glucosaid Energy drink, Tasty Time Pops orange flovour drink, Tasty Time Fitz Apple drink and Tasty Time mixed orange flavor drink.

They were also alleged to have packaged and labeled the said products in a manner likely to create the wrong impression that they were genuine.

The agency further alleged that the defendants sold the same unregistered products to the general public.

According to the prosecutor, Mrs. Chinyere Okon, the offences are contrary to sections 1(1), 5(a) and 5(e), and punishable under sections 6(1)(a) and 17(4) of the Foods and Drugs and related Products Cap. F33, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004.

The defendants pleaded not guilty to the charges. Following the plea, their counsel, Dayo Adamolekun, pleaded with the court to admit his clients on bail on self-recognition, or grant the accused the most liberal terms.

Adamolekun hinged his application on his client’s health status, adding that the first defendant, Kole, is an elder statesman and an employer of labour, who has over 400 employees in his firm.

Furthermore, Adamolekun told the court that the company had been sealed, leaving the 400 workers jobless.

He further stated that bail is a right guaranteed by the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The counsel to NAFDAC did not oppose the bail application.

In her short ruling, Justice Rabiu-Shagari, said based on the plea, she would not ask the defendant to go to the prison, but to continue to enjoy the administrative bail granted them by NAFDAC till Monday, when she woul rule on the bail application.

The judge, however, ordered the defendant to produce a director, either from the federal or Lagos State Ministry, Parastatals, Departments or Agencies (MDAs), to sign an undertaken to produce him in court.

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