COVID-19: Retailers caught gouging prices of hand sanitisers will be prosecuted, says FCCPC

The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) has insisted on prosecuting retailers found gouging prices of hand sanitizers and face masks as Nigerians battle to limit the spread of Covid-19.

The Director-General of the Commission, Babatunde Irukera, disclosed this while speaking on Channels Television, adding that early interventions since the index case was announced in February have helped to control the prices of these protective gear.

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He explained that the commission has engaged with manufacturers to ensure that the products are available and in a steady supply.

If not for the early intervention, just imagines what the prices will be today. A day after the index case was announced, prices shot to 2k5 and it went back to 850 after our enforcement.

Just imagine if there was no advisory or enforcement at all, those prices would have been prohibitive by now.

We continue to encourage suppliers and manufacturers to make hand sanitisers available and increase supply.

We are engaging at different levels with suppliers just to make sure there is a steady supply.

Mr Irukera stressed that the commission has been able to act on tip-off and feedbacks from social media while calling on the public to speak up when they are being exploited for these items.

What we have done is immediately we noticed there was price gouging, we issued an advisory, discouraging and prohibiting it as a violation of the law and we followed that through with surveillance and enforcement.

Some of the most effective regulatory tools are knowing what battle to pick; we really don’t have the capacity to be everywhere in the country, so we don’t have a task force to police the whole city, not to talk of the country.

We have used social media for surveillance, enforcement to harvest complaints and intel; go to those places to enforce and it modifies the behaviours of others who don’t want to become subject of our enforcement.

He urged retailers to recognise that price gouging is a violation of the law, and any attempt to take advantage of people and their vulnerability at the time of a global public health emergency is a violation of the law.

The FCCPC boss stated that any retailer found guilty of manipulating prices will be prosecuted.