By Editor

Under the aegies of its recently appointed acting Vice Chairman and CEO, Dr. Adamu Abdullahi, the Nigerian Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) today published a statement condemning the continuing consumer price increases in the country, despite the recent strengthening of the Naira currency.

The agency was, wisely, quick to point out that “the FCCPC cannot directly regulate prices.” Yet, it promised to “utilise its existing legal framework to enforce fair competition and consumer protection provisions. This includes monitoring and investigating unusual price hikes, addressing complaints filed by consumers, and taking action against any businesses found to be engaging in anti-competitive practices such as price-fixing, price gouging or cartel formation.”

In an interesting twist, the FCCPC also said that it had appointed so-called “operatives” (whom we imagine to be akin to contracted on-the-ground shadow buyers of goods and services) to report back to the Commission in their apparently ongoing “monitoring of both formal and informal markets.”

To support these ‘operatives,’ the FCCPC called upon regular consumers, trade associations, and farmer groups “to identify and remove unnecessary barriers to entry in various sectors, combat price-fixing, and dismantle cartels,” in the hopes of subsquent consumer-protection enforcement actions and, ultimately, lower prices for consumers.