By Pascal Ibe

Claim

Nigerians on social media posted a video of men arrested for the production of fake drugs in Lagos, alongside the claim that it was recent.

Verdict

This claim is MISLEADING. This video was first posted on YouTube in 2018, but Nigerians kept recirculating it till this moment.

Full Text

Nigerians on social media have published a video showing men arrested for the production of fake drugs in an unfinished building.

An X user, @adeoluorisa, posted the video and wrote, “Emeka Madu and his cohorts were arrested for making Fake Malaria Drugs in an uncompleted building in Ikotun, Lagos state.
Imagine taking malaria drugs and end up getting worse diseases. List to his background. Sec school drop out from his region. He ended up in Lagos to be producing deadly drugs for “survival”. Examples like his abound!
A ti gba àlejò ọ̀ràn

These criminals have been operating for four years. And we did not notice it. Neighbours? Govt? Unfortunately!

One of the biggest wars we may have to fight is war against fake drugs in our land.
Imagine somebody making wealth by selling deadly drugs. Listen to the interview, how bold and confident he is. The wealth from the crime enables him to afford to buy land and property from the poor and vulnerable. This is rather unfortunate… really.

many more of these terrible criminals are dotted all over our land producing deadly drugs to destroy us all.

And is the law doing enough about this? Is the punishment severe enough? Are we as people conscious enough about who occupy our space. Our streets. Our region?
This is so pathetic!

A Facebook user, Olusegun Adeniyi, and a columnist, Ugo Egbujuo shared this post recently

Verification

A keyword search on Google by FACTWATCH Nigeria indicated that this video was first posted on YouTube by Channels Television in December 2018.

In a publication by Guardian Nigeria in 2018, the Inspector-General of Police’s Intelligence Response Team (IRT) arrested four persons operating an illegal fake drug production factory in Lagos.

A former Force Public Relations Officer, Ag. DCP Jimoh Moshood told newsmen in Lagos that the suspects operated the factory from a four-bedroom building located at No. 2 Okunnenye Street, Ikotun Egbe area of the state. Newspaper subscription bundles

Parading the suspects at the factory premises, Moshood said the IRT operatives raided the secret factory on Thursday, following a tip-off.

According to him, large quantities of suspected fake drugs were seized during the raid.

Vanguard and other media organizations in Nigeria also reported this story.

FactCheckHub, Dubawa, and other verification platforms in Nigeria have debunked this claim in 2024.

Conclusion

In an unending online bigotry in the Nigerian social media space, bigots from different ethnic groups continue to recycle old videos to malign each other.