'N500m Lost To Fake Auto Parts'

Nigeria is losing an estimated sum of N500 million annually to fake automobile parts, managing consultant, Newsletters Limited, Dr. Oscar Odiboh has said.

Odiboh disclosed this at a seminar on the impact of fake auto parts organised by the Guild of Motoring Correspondents (GMC), Nigeria at Lagos Sheraton Hotels and Towers, Ikeja.

Delivering a paper titled: Fake Auto Parts: Time for Genuine Action, Dr. Odiboh noted that this money is being lost to local fabricators, faceless rebuilders and imitation importers, adding that the automobile industry is one with a chequered history, notable achievements and contemporary challenges.

He said a car is made up of an average 14,000 parts and each one can be faked, and each car part has an average six versions in Nigeria. According to him, genuineness, availability, affordability and longevity combine to create the opportunity for fake spare parts. He stated that where the part is genuine, available and unaffordable, consumers would search for shortcuts by patronising fake ones that are affordable, available and could be used maximally.

He further said where the parts are genuine, with long life but unavailable, some car owners would go for the available ones, as long as they can put their cars back on the road with minimal expenses. He also pointed out that any genuine part that is unnecessarily replaced too frequently, sometimes due to the uncharitable and fraudulent activities of service advisers and technicians, is of no use to the average car owner. “Car owners do not want any car part, even if genuine, to dig holes in their pockets,” Odiboh stressed.

According to him affordability seems to be the most prevalent factor because it obeys the law of relativity and bows to the reality of socioeconomic conditions. “What one man could afford may be unaffordable to another, even if they drive the same type of car; and in situations of economic downturn, affordability determines the co-existence of genuine parts and their fake counterparts. In other words, the relativity of affordability creates opportunity for fake parts; while economic conditions either strengthens it or weakens it,” he explained.