Rice Palliatives Distributed Were Certified By NAFDAC, FG Tells States

The Federal Government has insisted that the bags of rice shared as palliatives to the various state governments were certified by the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC).

Sadiya Umar-Farouq, Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, stated this at the daily briefing of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 on Monday in reaction to allegations by South-West states over the quality of the rice supplied.

The Oyo and Ondo state governments claimed that the Federal Government had distributed weevil-infested rice, saying that it was not fit for human consumption.

But Farouq insisted that all the bags of rice were inspected by NAFDAC, the government’s food regulatory agency, and were approved for distribution.

She described the reports of spoilt rice distribution as fake news.

“On the issue of rice distribution, we distributed the rice to states.

“The trucks of rice were handed over to us by the Nigeria Customs Service and were assessed by NAFDAC, who issued a clearance before the goods were released for onward distribution to the states.

“So, as far as we are concerned, the rice was certified fit for human consumption. We had an issue in Oyo, which was officially reported this morning.”

“But two or three days back, we’ve seen news flying that all the rice we took to the South-West and parts of this country are bad.

“And that Lagos has taken its own to the lagoon and that other states have rejected them. I want to say categorically that those are fake news. They are not true,” she said.