Agency to prosecute producers of fake lubricants

The Director-General of SON, Dr Joseph Odumodu, said this in Abuja on Tuesday, when he met with members of the Lubricant Producers Association of Nigeria (LUPAN).

"We have to involve a strong surveillance with your support to ensure that those, who have products in the market are the right products, which means we have the base oil and all the additives that should be in those products.

"We also will expect that every product must be registered; there is lot of counterfeiting; some people use up the cans and then refill it and sell as the original products.

"So, we also need to take up certain responsibilities (some are doing it already) that every product must have a tamper evidence kind of cover, so that when people open your product even if they refill it, they will not be able to spend all the money you are spending in ensuring that you protect your own brands.’’

He said that SON had begun monitoring and sampling base oil across the country to curtail production of adulterated lubricants and importation of poor quality oil.

Odumodu said that with the help of a database installed in the plant, the exercise would help reduce the rate of diversion and adulteration of lubricants.

He said that nearly 300 million metric tons of base oil were imported to the country for the production of lubricants annually.

He said that an average of 300 million litres of lubricants were consumed in Nigeria annually.

Odumodu said that SON would monitor the quality of lubricants produced in Nigeria with a view to stopping the sale of base oil to unsuspecting Nigerians.

He pledged the organisation’s commitment to tackling other sharp practices.

The director-general said the exercise would also check the import of substandard lubricants, profile base oil import per consignee as against capacity utilisation so as to deal with cases of diversion.

"In line with zero tolerance to substandard product policy of the government, SON has constantly ensured production of good quality products and services by dogged commitment to our core values of expertise, discipline, integrity, consumer focus and teamwork.”

The Chairman of the association, Mr Anthony Enukeme, said that the meeting was to discuss the problem of counterfeit oil production and to chart the way forward.

Enukeme pledged support to SON’s efforts at ensuring that only certified lubricants were allowed into the Nigerian market.

"The essence of our coming together today is to know how best to fight the ills of bad oil that is in the market.

"A good quantity of this oil in the market is not produced in Nigeria.

"It is bleached abroad and made its way through the back door into the system.

"The only person, who can fight this ill are the standard organisation of Nigeria, the police and navy.

"That is why we are here to find out how best we can do that.

"Even our business is suffering because when you are now trying to produce a good one and the fake one is coming in you cannot sell because the fake one is cheaper.’’