The former boss of food safety was arrested for bribery in the massive fake supplementary scandal

The anti-corruption police of the Ministry of Public Security (C03) said on Tuesday that Phong and Dinh Quang Minh, director of the Center for Food Safety, Nguyen Thi Minh Hai, will be pursuing his deputy director of the specialist Le Thi Hien, and Cao van Trung, deputy head of the Department of Growing Small.

Hai was put under house arrest while the remaining four were recorded.

From 2015 to the end of last year, Phong served as head of the VFA for two terms. The agency is commissioned to advise the Minister of Health and enforce regulations for food safety.

Their arrests are part of a more comprehensive examination of the production of hundreds of tons of fake nutritional supplements from Nguyen Nang Manh, CEO of Megaphaco and Chairman of Mediusa, both in Hanoi.

According to C03, manh and his employees distributed fake nutritional supplements by capturing inspection teams from the VFA to secure cheap reports, instructions for the remedial of violations and additional time to comply with the regulations.

The five officers are also wrongly approved for four good certifications for manufacturing practice for Mediphar and Mediusa's factories and to have issued 20 product registration certificates for nine companies.

Previously, the police had also arrested manh and several others, including directors and accounting employees from related companies to produce and act fake food products, and violate the accounting regulations, which caused serious consequences.

The investigators said that the group used inferior or unable to be found, imported some from China, and the final products were incorrectly imported as from the USA or Europe.

Tests showed that the actual quantities of many ingredients were less than 30% of the specified product labels.

The police confiscated about 100 tons of fake supplements in a facility in Vietnam. Photo of police

Since 2016, ManH and his accomplices have supposedly set up several companies to legalize the production and sale of fake nutritional supplements to older people and children.

The counterfeits occurred in the entire production process, starting with the import of raw materials to production, packaging and distribution.

The group also maintained two sets of accounting documents, one for internal use and one for tax authorities to avoid taxes, which caused the state loss that has not yet been announced.

When they were alerted on the examination, they tried to destroy evidence, to close and flee factories. Nevertheless, the raids of police officers found 100 tons of fake food supplements.