Friday, January 11, 2008

Pfizer Nigeria Vice President , Managing Directors on the run, Medical Director arrested in Nigeria

Nigeria has sued Pfizer for over $8.5 billion, alleging the U.S. drug company caused the death of Nigerian children when it conducted a clinical trial in the country. As Reported by BrandWeek N RX. Apparently the Nigerian government is also going after the executives of the psych drug maker Pfizer, who apparently decided that using Nigerian children as experiment subjects for drug tests was a good idea. The Nigerian Government has decided that this is a Bad Idea(tm). You know that what you did was bad when the Nigerian government is coming after you, especially since they have become sensitive to internet scams originating form their country.

According to All Africa, Dr. Dogunro, a former medical director of Pfizer Inc, has been arrested by the police and the managing director for Pfizer Nigeria, Ms. Ngozi Oluwatoyin Edozien is on the run.

A federal High Court in Abuja, Nigeria issued the warrant for the arrest of eight former directors of Pfizer Nigeria.

Those affected were directors on the board of Pfizer Nigeria when the controversial Trovan clinical trial took place in Kano in which over 200 persons, mostly children, died allegedly as a result of the unapproved trial.

Among the eight directors are former Pfizer CEO William Steere, Samuel Ohuabunwa, A.Dogunro, Isa Dutse , Scott Hopkins, Mike Dunne, Debra Williams and Robert Buhl.

It is common among multinational corporations for the CEO to also be a director of each foreign subsidiary, which also results in certain legal responsibilities, and this is how the high-profile Mr. Steere was pulled into this criminal matter.

NgoryPfizer's Managing Director Ngozi, who is now on the run, is also Regional Director East, Central, and Anglo-lusophone (ECAWA) in Africa. She was born in Nigeria but grew up in the U.S. and went to Harvard Business School.

She then became a McKinsey consultant and worked in the UK and France. After McKinsey she spent about five years as a Pfizer Vice President in New York, responsible for planning and business development.
Here is the All Africa report:
A federal High Court in Abuja yesterday issued a warrant of arrest for eight former directors of a pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer Specialties Ltd.

Those affected were directors who were on the board of the company when a controversial Trovan clinical trial took place in Kano in which over 200 persons, mostly children, died allegedly as a result of the unapproved trial.

Already, a former medical director of the company, Dr. Dogunro, has been arrested by the police.

Others affected by the warrant of arrest, including the immediate past managing director, Ngozi Edozien, are said to be on the run.

LEADERSHIP checks revealed that the corporate headquarters of Pfizer in Lagos was padlocked throughout yesterday, while most of its management staff refused to turn up at their duty post, apparently to avoid being picked up by security agents.

Both the federal and Kano State governments had instituted criminal charges against Pfizer over its alleged role in the deaths of the children who received the drug during a meningitis epidemic in 1996.

They are claiming $700 million in damages and restitution from Pfizer.

On its own side, the government had alleged Pfizer researchers selected 200 children and infants from crowds in Kano and gave about half of the group an untested anti-biotic, Trovan, without any approval from any authority.

The criminal charges had also named Pfizer Nigeria subsidiary and the eight former senior staff.


Trovan came to public disclosure in 2000 when The Washington Post published the result of a year-long investigation into pharmaceutical testing in the developing world.

And Nigerians who were confronted with the shocking views went to the streets demonstrating and demanding for investigation.

The families of the children who Pfizer used allegedly as laboratory guinea pigs were led to believe and in fact understood that the defendants were providing their children with voluntary relief, clearly focused humanitarian medical intervention and nothing more, the suit had said.

Although Pfizer is currently contesting the case, but the investigating committee into Pfizer drug trial in Kano earlier raised by then minister of health, Dr. Tim Menakaya, and headed by Dr. Abdulsalam Nasidi had indicted Pfizer, which instituted a legal case at the Federal High Court to quash the investigation committee's report.

Pfizer's insistence that it is innocent has not prevented accusation and counter-accusation from flowing.

The company has consistently maintained that all necessary approvals were sought and obtained from relevant federal and state agencies before administering the drug in Kano State.

"We did the right thing and we answered the country's call," the then managing director, Ms. Ngozi Edozien, told LEADERSHIP recently.

But the Federal Ministry of Health, Kano State Ministry of Health and NAFDAC have denied approving the administration of the drug in Kano.

The case comes up today.

No comments: