Director General, NAFDAC,Moji Adeyeye

The Director General of National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control, NAFDAC, Moji Adeyeye, has called for the establishment of an ECOWAS enforcement agency to help checkmate the influx of fake and substandard drugs through West African borders.

Adeyeye made the call on Channels TV breakfast show, Sunrise Daily monitored by our correspondent.

According to her, there’s also the need to strengthen smaller regulatory agencies across countries to help combat the issues of fake drugs. “If Any country is weak, we all are weak”.

She however noted that though NAFDAC is saddled with a lot of responsibility, its functions and the risks involved in the Agency are really not well understood by those in government”.

“There needs to be a general understanding government and NAFDAC so that we will be well funded and staff well paid and compensated”.

She added that unless staff are well paid and the Agency well funded, compromise will be inevitable.

“NAFDAC has survived mainly on User fees and internally Generated Revenues, IGR, which is less than 20 per cent of the total revenue generated”.

“We have however submitted our 2019 budget proposal and awaiting government’s approval”.

“I believe the government should do more because it gives little or nothing to us. Imagine a scenario where your budget is N80 billion and you’re given N200 million. We need to get things right”, she said.