By Augustine Akhilomen
The Federal Government has issued a stern warning to all traders across the country to crash prices of food items amid the current economic hardship.
This warning was issued on Thursday by the Executive Vice Chairman of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), Tunji Bello.
He said that the issue of critical national importance of the day is the growing trend of unreasonable pricing of consumer goods and services across the country and the unwholesome practice of market associations engaged in price fixing.
Explaining further, FCCPC also said it would not fail to invoke the full weight of the law on defaulters.
“The issue of critical national importance of the day is the growing trend of unreasonable pricing of consumer goods and services across the country, and the unwholesome practice of market associations engaged in price fixing.
‘’As a responsive organization, we have carried out discreet market surveys extensively across the country in the past few weeks. Our findings are quite disturbing, to put it mildly. Therefore, our gathering here today (yesterday) is to underscore the gravity of the situation and the urgency of the need to work together to check this unwholesome development.
“As a statutory body whose mandate is to cater to consumer rights, we cannot allow this unhealthy trend to continue. To be sure, we quite recognize that an unfavourable exchange rate has negatively impacted the cost of production in local currency. However, the margin in pricing goods and services is unreasonable or excessive in a few cases.
‘’We have observed, for instance, that the margin in the prices of imported goods are very disproportionate in many cases; and in the case of locally produced goods, excessively inflated. This is an untenable situation, particularly in the retail segment, where we have identified patterns of price fixing perpetrated by some market associations, price gouging, and other anti-consumer practices.
“In view of the current situation in Nigeria, let me however be very unequivocal. Price gouging and price fixing are not only unethical, but patently illegal under the FCCPA.
“As such, the FCCPC has the will and the capacity to invoke the full weight of the law against those found culpable of exploiting consumers.
“However, our approach today is not punitive or adversarial… dialogue and collaboration are equally important tools in fostering a fair marketplace.”