The Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Mojisola Adeyeye, has called for the death penalty for drug peddlers, particularly those involved in selling counterfeit medicines that result in the deaths of children.
Speaking on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief on Friday, February 7, Adeyeye emphasised that only strict and severe penalties could effectively deter drug peddlers. She cited a recent incident in which children’s medicine, bought for about N13,000 and resold for N3,000, was found to contain no active ingredients when tested in NAFDAC’s Kaduna lab.
“That raised an alarm. Guess what? When we tested the medicine, there was nothing inside. So, I want the death penalty,” Adeyeye said.
She further argued that selling substandard medicine could be just as deadly as directly harming a child, stating, “You don’t need to put a gun to a child’s head to kill them. Just give them bad medicine.”
Adeyeye also highlighted the need for stronger cooperation with the judiciary and the National Assembly to make the proposal a reality. She explained that while NAFDAC has been doing its part to tackle the issue of substandard drugs, the lack of stringent penalties has hindered the agency’s efforts.
“Someone brought in 225mg of Tramadol, which can kill a person or fry their brain, and the punishment is just five years in prison or a fine of N250,000,” she said, pointing out that such a fine is often negligible compared to the severity of the crime. “Who doesn’t know that a person can simply withdraw N250,000 from an ATM?”
According to Adeyeye, the lack of sufficient deterrents leads to repeat offences, as offenders face little to no consequences for their actions.
She stressed that NAFDAC’s ability to combat the problem is limited without stronger legal measures and a firm judicial stance.
The NAFDAC boss reiterated her call for stricter laws and penalties, saying, “If our laws are not strong enough or the judiciary is not firm in its stance, we will continue to face this challenge. We are working with the National Assembly to make our penalties much stiffer. But if you kill a child with bad medicine, you deserve to die.”
This bold proposal has sparked widespread discussion about the effectiveness of current penalties and the urgent need for stricter laws to combat the growing issue of counterfeit and substandard medicines in Nigeria.
