One Nonso Nwobodo, 39, has been arrested by operatives of the Nigerian Police Force in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, for allegedly repackaging local rice into bags labelled as foreign rice.
The trader was said to have been involved in the act in a bid to maximize profits.
We understands that Nwobodo was arrested on Saturday at around 4:15 pm in the Durumi area of the FCT, specifically at Plot 740 centenary credentials.
A government source who confirmed the development to journalists said Nonso was discovered to be packing locally produced rice into printed bags that were made to resemble foreign rice bags.
According to him, this deceptive act aimed to mislead the public into believing that the rice was imported. As a result of the operation, a total of 160 bags of rice, varying in size from 5kg to 50kg, were seized as evidence.
“Nonso Nwobodo was re-packaging local rice to a different designed foreign bags of rice with an attempt to sell them as foreign rice.
“He was arrested with 160 bags of different sizes of rice ranging from 5kg to 50kg already rebagged to look like foreign rice. 53 empty bags of local rice that had already been rebagged to foreign bags were recovered.
“While 590 new empty foreign bags of rice that are yet to be filled with rice were also recovered at the scene. Police have confiscated the rice,” SaharaReporters quoted the source as saying.