The title of this piece is an adaption from a classical novel by the British writer, James Hardly Chase, titled ‘No Orchid For Miss Blandish’, written in 1939. The novel centered round Miss Blandish, who resided in an unnamed Midwestern town in the United Kingdom during the late 1920’s, where a local thug and gang leader named Riley learned that the wealthy socialite will be wearing an expensive diamond necklace to her birthday celebration.
The plan was for Riley and his gang to steal the necklace and sell it for cash. However, the inexperienced criminals not only managed to kidnap Miss Blandish and her boyfriend, but also accidentally killed him, which forced a change in their plan, which was, to instead, hold Miss Blandish for ransom, reasoning that her millionaire father would pay more to get his daughter back safely than the necklace’s worth.
However, their plan began to fall apart when a rival mob, led by the sadistic and mentally unbalanced Slim Grisson, found out about Riley’s plan, and kidnaps Miss Blandish from the gang. Mr. Blandish pays the ransom to Slim, but his daughter was not returned. Slim, who became increasingly obsessed with Miss Blandish, decided to keep her hidden in a secret room inside one of his nightclubs, where she was repeatedly abused.
Meanwhile, the police are on the trail of the kidnappers, and Dave Fenner, an ex-journalist and private investigator is hired to rescue her and deal with the gangsters. Fenner and the police eventually worked out where the young socialite was located and trace her to the club, where a gun battle ensued. Slim was killed, and Miss Blandish rescued, but after months of torture and drugs at the hands of her captors, Miss Blandish could not cope with her new-found freedom, and eventually kills herself.
In Nigeria, Professor Mojisola Adeyeye, the Director General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration And Control (NAFDAC), took one of the most difficult jobs in the land – fighting those who are hell-bent on killing thousands of their compatriots through fake and counterfeit drugs, and in the process, making millions of naira daily.
Those are Nigerians with their foreign collaborators who have sold their souls to the devil. The fake drug business is a multi-million-dollar industry run by cartels who are ready to die and are ever willing to kill.
For Adeyeye to succeed in her chosen field, she must be ready to headbutt those criminals into submission, and they are also not willing to give up the trade without a fight. In the last few weeks, she has taken the fight to the criminals, shutting down fake drugs hubs in Abia, Lagos, and Onitsha, in Anambra State.
So far, over 11,000 shops located across the country have been closed down while 40 individuals have been arrested for selling death to unsuspecting members of the public in the name of drugs. Over 4,000 shops were put under lock and key in Onitsha, 3,027 in Lagos, and another 4,000 in Aba since the commencement of the operations. But the operation was not done by NAFDAC staff alone as they would have been marked for death, if not already dead, for taking the fight to the lion’s den.
The office of the National Security Adviser (NSA), provided 400 security officers for the Onitsha Market raid, 350 in Aba, and over 250 in Lagos to ensure the safety of NAFDAC staff. The known fake drug markets in Aba are the Ariaria and Eziukwu Markets; in Anambra State, their base is the Bridge Head Market, Ontisha, while in Lagos, Idumota Open Drug Market is where they operate from. At the end of the raids, 87 truckloads of banned, expired and sub-standard drugs were evacuated from the markets.
As said earlier, the drug business is a multi-billion-naira one in Nigeria. Many of the big cartels in the trade travelled to China and other countries to import fake and sub-standards products into Nigeria.
Some operate in residential areas in Nigeria, where they ‘manufactured’ their own products or simply get a machine to change the expiry dates on drugs which they later re-introduce into the market. Those importing sub-standard products bribe their crooked customs agents at the various ports of entry into the country. In the process, they smile to their banks while many Nigerians have met their untimely deaths through their nefarious activities.
What NAFDAC seized from the three markets was over N1 trillion. In 2024, over N43 billion worth of fake and counterfeit drugs was destroyed by the Agency. Yet, the traders remain undaunted.
Perhaps, the NAFDAC DG should read up on what one of her predecessors, the late Dora Akunyili went through in the hands of drug cartels in the country. Akunyili was appointed DG of NAFDAC in 2001 by former President Olusegun Obasanjo and she took the battle so personal after losing one of her sisters to fake drugs. In 1988, her sister died because she was given a fake insulin for her diabetes. Not only was it fake and did not contain the insulin she was supposed to take, what she bought was also contaminated and it gave her abscesses. She did not respond to antibiotics, and the family watched helplessly until she died.
Before Akunyili took the job, deaths linked to fake drugs were commonplace in Nigeria. A survey done by NAFDAC revealed that at least 41% of the drugs in circulation were thought to be counterfeit. And this, she said, was a conservative estimate. Some reports suggested as much as 80% of medicines in the country was fake.
So, when she assumed office, Akunyili took the battle to the cartels. She was offered money to ‘calm down’, which she turned down. She was also threatened, but it didn’t deter her, and an assassination attempt was made on her life in 2003 while she was on her way to her village for the Christmas and New Year celebration. But she escaped by the whiskers, as bullets shattered the back windscreen of the car, pierced her head scarf, and burned her scalp. A bus driver took the bullet, dying on the spot.
Her immediate family put a lot of pressure on her to quit but she remained undaunted. ‘’When the drug counterfeiters heard I might be quitting the job, they started popping champagne in Onitsha market, rejoicing that this wicked woman would soon quit the scene,” Akunyili told newsmen years later.
However, she approved the relocation of her family to the United States of America (USA), after the family was issued with a Green Card in 1996. She had boldly said that if she had left, the drug counterfeiters would have felt that they had won, and that would have discouraged all the staff working to restore sanity. The Nigerian government had to allocate eight-armed security men to guard Akunyili and a bulletproof car was also attached to her office. She was DG of NAFDAC until 2009 when another administration appointed her as Information Minister.
Adeyeye and her staff must remain undaunted in the battle against the fake drugs cartels. With the price of original drugs beyond the reach of most Nigerians, the counterfeiters are having a ball. Again, due to illiteracy, many Nigerians do not know how to identify fake drugs from the authentic. Again, the punishment for those selling and importing fake drugs into the country is not enough to serve as a deterrent, as they are granted bail after only a few days in prison.
Under the present Act that established NAFDAC, fake drug importers and sellers are liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding N500,000 or imprisonment for a term of not less than two years or both. As expected, many of those arrested and prosecuted easily pay the fine and walk free after few days in prison.
Adeyeye is now calling for the death penalty for anyone caught manufacturing or selling counterfeit drugs in the country. She described illicit drug barons as merchants of death in society who prioritize making huge illicit money at the expense of the lives of their fellow human beings. Adeyeye cited the case of a person importing a highly dangerous dose of Tramadol, which could cause severe harm or death, yet only receiving a minimal sentence of five years in prison or a fine of N250,000.
She disclosed that during the latest operation, which was supported by security agencies, NAFDAC seized large quantities of counterfeit and improperly stored vaccines, prescription medicines, USAID-donated anti-retroviral drugs, and expired condoms. Tafrodol, an opioid banned in Nigeria, and oxytocin injections used during labour, were also seized, she said. “These products were discovered stacked in toilets, under staircases and rooftops at very high temperatures, without consideration for cold chain storage requirements.” Adeyeye urged lawmakers to fast-track an amendment of laws on drugs and health “to include life sentence (and) death penalties for crimes committed under these Acts.”
As expected, the NAFDAC DG has now revealed that she has been receiving death threats from the fake drug cartels but that she was not bothered. She recounted how staff members had faced kidnapping attempts and physical threats due to their work. “I told you about the attempted murder about six months ago. One of our staff members in Kano had his child kidnapped because he was doing his job. Fortunately, the child escaped. For me, I have two policemen living in my house 24/7 in Abuja and Lagos. but I don’t have a life. I can’t go anywhere without police escorts. That’s not my way of living, but I don’t have a choice because we must save our country. Nonetheless, I also use common sense.”
Indeed, she must always watch her back, as those she is depriving of making millions through their nefarious activities won’t sit down and watch. Already, the Pan-Yoruba socio-cultural organisation, Afenifere, has called on the federal government to provide water-tight security around the NAFDAC DG.
While Miss Blandish in the James Hardly Chase novel lost her life to those who wanted to make money from her rich father, nothing negative must happen to Prof. Adeyeye who is presently doing a yeoman’s work of ridding the country of those bent on making money out of the misery of others.
See you next week.
