Fake test kits:Dep.Gov declared Wanted by NAFDAC

November 20, 2006 :: Simon Ibe Daily Champion,Lagos

National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has declared former Akwa Ibom State Deputy governor, Obong Christopher Ekpenyong wanted. He is being sought for alleged illegal repackaging of HIV test kits, a brand of Bundi International Diagnostics Limited with NAFDAC's due process approval, and sold same under a new name using his office address. In a statement made available to Daily Champion and signed by NAFDAC Public Relations Officer, Mrs. Christie Obiazikwor, the commission said Dr. Ekpenyong allegedly repackaged the HIV kits with a new lot number, new manufacturing and expiration dates and deceptively supplied them for the use of Bayelsa State Government HIV Prevention Campaign Programmes. The statement said that NAFDAC had issued several invitations to Dr. Ekpenyong for questioning but he allegedly refused to honour the invitations. Dr. Ekpenyong reacting to the accusation said he was in his house in Akwa Ibom State and that his homes and offices are known to everyone, stressing that since he was invited about two months ago and went to interact with the deputy director of NAFDAC who told him what to do, nobody had he invited him again. He said the deputy director told him that his company should write to the Bayelsa State government withdrawing the kits, which he has since done. He said the official also said he should go and resolve his differences with Bundi, but Ekpenyong pointed out that it was clear that Bundi was blackmailing him in a bid to get him to influence the Bayelsa State government to award them a contract for the supply of about one million pieces of the kits, which he said was outside his power to do. He told Daily Champion that what transpired was a business transaction between his company and Bundi and a personal matter, stressing that he was only the chairman of the company. According to him he has already got in touch with the director of Enforcement of NAFDAC, assuring him that since they desired his presence, he would come to them on Tuesday next week. However, quoting part of a letter he wrote to the agency on the matter dated October 18, Ekpenyong stated that immediately after the test kits were duly delivered to the Bayelsa State Government for a particular programme which had since been launched and distributed to beneficiaries in the state. It was purely a commercial transaction - (buy and supply), "that Gestric hever represented to the Bayelsa State government that it is a manufacturer or a manufacturers' agent in respect of HIV-1/2 test kits.