Pharmacists declare NAFDAC directive that members to register with the agency unlawful

Saturday, August 2, 2025 - Pharmacists under the aegis of the Association of Communality Pharmacists of Nigeria (ACPN) have declared as unlawful, a directive by the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) to all operators in the recently sealed drug markets in Idumota, Lagos, Ariaria in Abia, and Head Bridge, Onitsha to register with the agency.

NAFDAC had instructed the pharmacists under the listed places to register its premises for a national database.

The National Chairman of ACPN, Pharm Ezeh Amrose Igwekamma, said the directive by NAFDAC was too difficult to ignore, and an attempt to usurp the constitutional powers of the Pharmacists Council of Nigeria (PCN), adding that the action could disrupt the pharmaceutical sector of the nation’s economy.

‘’The ACPN observed with distress a recent directive by NAFDAC decreeing all operators in the recently sealed Idumota in Lagos, Ariaria in Abia, and Head Bridge markets to register with NAFDAC on a certain portal for a national database.’’

Continuing, he said, ‘’in a season of aberrations that has pervaded the health sector in recent days, we find this unlawful directive too difficult to ignore. The two principal regulatory agencies in the drug distribution bracket of the pharma sector have their clear-cut statutory functions.’’

He explained that the PCN has a specific approbation in law to inspect and register pharmaceutical premises engaged in retail, wholesale, importation, manufacturing, scientific offices, patent medicine vending and satellite pharmacies.

Igwekamma posited that the Federal High Court in various states of the federation validated the mandate of the PCN in the regulation and control of pharmaceutical premises in Nigeria through over 15 court judgements.

‘’All the Federal High Court judgements are unanimous that the CPN has a specific approbation in law to regulate and control pharmaceutical premises in all its aspects and ramifications at both the public and private sector levels, including private and public hospitals in Nigeria.

Igwekamma, who spoke at the 44^th Annual National International Scientific Conference of the association in Awka, Anambra State also said that  “NAFDAC by virtue of Section 5 of its enabling Act has powers to regulate and control the sales, distribution, and marketing of food, drugs, medical devices and water.”

He called for a regulatory framework that would streamline the powers and control of PCN and NAFDAC to avoid conflict of interest.

Igwekamma argued that “there is no law in Nigeria that gives NAFDAC powers to register premises in Nigeria.” He warned the agency to “desist forthwith from giving unlawful directives which creates disharmony in the pharmaceutical sector.”

He noted that successive Director Generals (DGs) of NAFDAC had attempted what he described as “the unholy agenda of annexing and appropriating the statutory powers of the PCN to NAFDAC, a propensity that is not only unlawful but condemnable because the incumbent DG NAFDAC remains unrepentant in the quest to turn NAFDAC to a revenue-generating agency which ACPN does not endorse.”

He further stated that “some of the ongoing activities of NAFDAC in the area of the track and trace, as well as the bioequivalence and bioavailability (BA/BA) study for even generic products which NAFDAC is making compulsory is unprecedented in any country and it will further make drug prices soar by at least another 100 percent above current baseline prices.”