Counterfeiters up their game

By Moses Mwathi

As Kenya’s army inches closer to Kismayu, local industrialists are looking up for better times. The Somalia port city is a major gateway of counterfeit goods and weapons into the country.

Counterfeiters have been flooding the East African region with imitations, fake and low quality commodities in systematic and well-knit syndicate. The nefarious trade has the capacity to cripple the industrial sector. The vice now enjoys a direct link to money laundering and drug trafficking.

Fake cigarettes packed in bags were impounded in Nairobi, recently. [Photo: Collins Kweyu/Standard]

“The counterfeiting has gone a notch higher. Our popular products are being imitated in Asian countries and then passed off as genuine in our markets at very irresistible and ambrosial prices,” Mr Casper Aluoch of the Anti-Counterfeiting Agency of Kenya (ACAK) told The Underworld.

The popular products that fetch huge profits for the counterfeiters are electronics, stationery and medical drugs. They are smuggled through porous borders and the ports of Mombasa and Dar es Salaam.

The Haco Tiger Brands, the manufacturers of home care products and stationery is one of the home grown industries that has bore the brunt of the soaring vice. A while ago, the intelligence unit of the plant tipped off ACAK over two containers carrying fake ballpoint pens worth over Sh50 million that were destined for the local market through the port of Mombasa from Shanghai, China.

Main Victims

“The war against Al Shabaab is a shot in the arm for us. It may cut off a link that has greatly contributed to influx of illegal products in the EAC states,” says Polycarp Igathe, the managing director of Haco Tiger Brands.

Haco are not the only victims. Unilever, Eveready batteries, manufacturers of cigarettes, glue, ink cartridges and computer accessories, pharmaceutical drugs such as Panadol and Hedex, toothpastes and some spirits produced by Kenya Wine Agencies have also been counterfeited.

Recently, Kenya Bureau of Standards (Kebs) in Eldoret seized thousands of labels of Viceroy Brandy, a popular spirit, in a swoop at the Eldoret Airport. According to Eldoret Kebs manager Samuel Ongido, the well-designed labels were manufactured in China and delivered to an illegal distillery in Nairobi, which produces fake Kwal spirits. Mr Ongindo says the seizure was a shocker to Kwal, which had no prior information that their products were being imitated.

“The Kiwi shoe polish had been completely phased out of Tanzanian market. We jointly embarked on anti-counterfeiting war with their officers who could differentiate between a counterfeit and original and finally we reclaimed a 70 per cent market share,” John Mponela, the director of Fair Competition Commission (FCC) in Tanzania told The Underworld.

However, this war driven by government anti-counterfeiting bodies of the five EAC members is less effective due to inadequate funding from their governments.

“It has become a risky and complex affair because some drug barons are increasingly embracing this vice,” adds Mponela.

More than 2,000 containers arrive at ports of Dar es Salaam and Mombasa daily, a herculean task for anti-counterfeiting bodies that are largely understaffed.

Detecting

This has forced companies to innovate ways of fighting the menace in collaboration with the Government. Some companies like Haco Tiger Brands and Mastermind hire private security firms and top sleuths to help in detecting counterfeits. Some inspectors in government bodies have no expertise in detection and blame manufacturers for not equipping them with necessary skills.

The process of getting suspected goods analysed in a government laboratory is expensive and slow. Most companies prefer to carry out tests on suspected products. In case the results are positive, they seek government assistance in investigating and prosecuting suspects.

Not all counterfeited products are retailed at low prices as most people think. Some meet the set standards like the genuine products. But the rogue traders evade taxes and cripple local industries.

Food stuffs such as sugar and rice are smuggled into Kenya through the porous Kenya/Somalia border while stationery, home care products, electronics and pharmaceutical products such as generic drugs find their way through ports of Dar es Salaam and Mombasa.

Mike Odero of Kebs in Isebania border point says motorbikes are used to ferry illegal goods across the border. He explained that most counterfeited electronics and home care products are smuggled through Kenya/Tanzania border points while Somalia/Kenya border points are notorious for food stuff such as sugar, rice and clothing.

“Motor bikes have become great means of transport for counterfeiters and their distributors. They bribe security officers manning the crossing or use panya routes to smuggle a whole container in minutes,” Mr Odero reveals.

Most counterfeited products such as pharmaceutical drugs pose serious health hazards, but the consumer seems more concerned about the pricing than quality.

Dangerous products

A woman lost her hair and suffered serious burns in the head after she used a counterfeited hair relaxer in Kilifi three months ago. Upon analysis, the content was found to be unfit for use as a hair relaxer.

As an industrialist recently quipped, you might one day go home and find your wife is a counterfeit.

However, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. The EAC legislative assembly is in the process of adopting anti-counterfeiting law to serve the region.