Medicine dealers accuse private cartel of hijacking Lagos drug hub

The National Association of Patent and Proprietary Medicine Dealers (NAPPMED) has accused a private cartel of hijacking the Lagos Coordinated Wholesale Centre (CWC).

NAPPMED also urged the Lagos State government to approve the building of a second CWC to save the state’s ailing drug distribution network.

The over 3,000 medicine marketers in the Liberation Zone on Lagos Island warned that they face being forced out of business following an alleged seizure and monopolisation of the CWC by a select group of unauthorised commercial entities.

The crisis revolves around the CWC, a facility situated at Ijora Badia, Lagos, originally established to streamline and regulate drug distribution in Nigeria’s most populous state.

The centre was conceived as a controlled hub for wholesale pharmaceutical trade, but NAPPMED alleged it has been commandeered by private interests, effectively marginalising the original contributors who financed its development.

Osita Nwajide, Chairman, NAPPMED, Liberation Zone Idumota, Lagos, raised the alarm on behalf of his association while addressing journalists during a rally organised by the association in Lagos.

Nwajide declared that the present CWC project has been hijacked and jettisoned, adding, “We paid for that land as medicine dealers, and now it has been ejected by a few. And we are demanding that you give back our land because we have called in for an account and proper explanation of what happened, but till now nobody has come to give us a full explanation.

“So we are demanding a second CWC, and it is very simple. Lagos State, with a populace of over 25 million, demands and needs a bigger CWC because the one they are building presently is only 720 shops, and we have over 3,000 medicine marketers in Lagos Island.’’

While emphasising that the land on which the Lagos CWC is being constructed was originally acquired through the contributions of genuine pharmaceutical stakeholders in Lagos Island, he said, “These marketers, over 3,000, invested in the hope that the CWC would offer fair, regulated, and accessible wholesale operations; the current reality reveals a different and disturbing picture.

He added, “The project has now been monopolised by a handful of actors, notably non-pharmaceutical businessmen and a few politically connected players. They have sidelined the very individuals who initiated and funded the project.

“With prices soaring as high as ₦93.5 million per unit, the vast majority of genuine pharmaceutical marketers, many of whom are small- and medium-scale operators, have been priced out of the very market they helped create.”

He further explained that the high price would create a lopsided business environment and also weaken drug supply security in Nigeria’s most populous state.

“This financial barrier is not only unethical but also cripples the core purpose of the CWC: to provide a regulated, inclusive marketplace for safe pharmaceutical distribution.

”This development has already left over 3,000 legitimate pharmaceutical marketers jobless or pushed to the margins.

“Many of them, who had run compliant businesses for years in open drug markets, are now excluded from formal operations in the ongoing CWC, leaving them with no viable alternative in the near future, Nwajide added.

Chief Dr. Gabriel Onyejamwa, a founding member of the Medicine Dealers Association and one of the original planners of the CWC, disclosed that the land title, initially held in trust for the dealers, was later transferred to City Pharmaceuticals under circumstances he described as questionable.

He also noted that attempts to engage the current management structure have been futile, and many long-time members are now completely cut out of decision-making processes.

The association called on the Federal and Lagos State Governments, the Pharmaceutical Council of Nigeria (PCN), and the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) to intervene urgently.

They advocate for the establishment of a second CWC that is inclusive, affordable, and capable of accommodating over 3,000 traders and recommend capping shop rental costs at affordable monthly rates to enable participation by low- and mid-income operators, alongside transparent regulatory oversight to prevent future abuses.

NAPPMED warned that Lagos, as a critical hub in Nigeria’s pharmaceutical supply chain, risks severe consequences if legitimate traders are excluded from the formal distribution network. Such outcomes could include the proliferation of counterfeit drugs, widening health disparities, and the resurgence of unregulated, informal drug markets.

Onyejamwa emphasised that if this exclusion persists, it could undermine the very objectives of pharmaceutical reform, destabilising public health and national security.

He concluded by asserting that equitable drug distribution is a matter of public health and national security, not a commodity to be auctioned to the highest bidder.

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