PAPDA Says Over 30 Phone Brands Registered With SON

The Phone and Allied Products Dealers Association (PAPDA) of Computer Village, Lagos has debunked the insinuation that the group encourages the trading of sub-standard mobile phones in the market.

The Group in a statement at the weekend said that its partnership with the Standard Organization of Nigeria (SON) has led to the registration of over 30 phone brands in the market.

The group through Mr. Ikye Onwe, its president, disclosed that sequel to the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) it signed with SON to rid the market of counterfeit products, PAPDA provides an office for SON officials for the establishment of a market desk.

Two staff of SON was subsequently deployed to operate from the office in order to mutually fight substandard products.

Specifically, to support the agency’s zero tolerance on sub-standard phones, PAPDA facilitated a joint trip for SON’s top management to China where they visited some phone factories and met with over 65 owners of phone factory to ensure that these factories no longer manufacture and import sub-standard phones into the Nigerian market.

Onwe also explained that the association and all importers of mobile phones in the Computer Village market agreed that from July 1, 2014, all mobile phones that would be sold in Nigeria would be products that have been duly registered with SON.

These products must have brand name marks.

According to him, passed off mobile phones such as “Nokia and Samsung products will not be stocked and displayed in stores owned by PAPDA’s members”.

Onwe said, in addition, the group agreed that all mobile phone brands sold in Nigeria market need to have a functional service centre which would cater to “after sales services”.

PAPDA has, however, warned that all products that lack these requirements would be confiscated and destroyed by the “joint taskforce of the SON and PAPDA”.

Some of the mobile phone brands that have passed SON’s comprehensive e-product registrations are Gowin, M’horse, Bontel, XGP, Tukaro, Q7, and Soloking. Others are U-Boss, Oktec, Maxtel, BML, MBO, Teemur, Aus, Mi-phone, Opsson, and MTK. Admet, H-mobile, DXD, Teenic, Simba, Ucall, Treesky, and Gionee and Kenxinda are the others.