More than 3,000 medicine dealers under the National Association of Patent and Proprietary Medicine Dealers (NAPPMED) have raised serious concerns over what they described as the hijack and monopolisation of the Lagos Coordinated Wholesale Centre (CWC) by a private cartel.
The dealers, operating within the Liberation Zone in Lagos Island, accused a group of politically connected and non-pharmaceutical businessmen of seizing control of the CWC located at Ijora Badia, Lagos.
The facility, originally established to regulate and streamline drug distribution in the state, has now reportedly been taken over, leaving the actual contributors sidelined.
Chairman of NAPPMED Liberation Zone, Osita Nwajide, who led a protest rally in Lagos, alleged that the land on which the CWC is being built was paid for by genuine medicine dealers, only for them to be excluded from the project without clear explanations.
“We paid for that land as medicine dealers, and now it has been hijacked by a few,” Nwajide said. “We have requested a full account and proper explanation of what happened, but none has been given.”
He warned that the current development threatens to push thousands of legitimate pharmaceutical marketers out of business, especially with shop units allegedly priced as high as ₦93.5 million.
“This financial barrier is not only unethical but cripples the core purpose of the CWC. It leaves over 3,000 compliant medicine dealers jobless or marginalised,” he said.
Chief Dr. Gabriel Onyejamwa, a founding member of the association, further revealed that the land title originally held in trust for the traders had allegedly been transferred to a private firm, City Pharmaceuticals, under suspicious circumstances.
The group is now calling on the Federal and Lagos State Governments, alongside regulatory bodies such as the Pharmaceutical Council of Nigeria (PCN) and the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), to urgently intervene.
They are demanding the establishment of a second, inclusive, and affordable CWC that will accommodate over 3,000 traders, with capped shop rental prices and transparent regulatory supervision.
NAPPMED warned that if the situation is not addressed, Lagos risks the resurgence of unregulated drug markets, proliferation of counterfeit medicines, and severe threats to public health and national drug security.
“The distribution of medicines is a matter of public health and national security.”
“It should not be left in the hands of a few at the expense of thousands who built the system,” Onyejamwa said.
