Officers from the Ministry of Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism have seized a massive haul of about 50,000 fake football jerseys of this year’s World Cup teams.
The raid, conducted at 9.30am on Monday, follwed a tip-off that the owner of a building in Jalan Klang Lama was stocking up the bootleg apparel in preparation for a spike in consumer demand in the run up to the World Cup. The illicit operation had been under observation for about a month before the raid was carried out.
Led by Trade Descriptions Unit head Aswadi Jaafar and deputy director of the ministry’s KL office Rosli Ahmad, the team of ten described the seizure as the biggest haul of imitation jerseys this year.
“The jerseys, worth RM500,000, are believed to be for distribution nationwide with the World Cup fever about to start,” Aswadi said to The Malay Mail Online‘s Fahirul N Ramli.
“Checks revealed they were brought in from a neighbouring country,” he said.
The jerseys bore marks of popular brands, such as Adidas, Nike, and Puma, and included designs of Malaysia Super League teams alongside their international World Cup counterparts.
Aswadi said a suspect, aged 39, was detained during the raid and was being investigated for supplying counterfeit merchandise.
The penalty for the offence is a maximum fine of RM10,000 per jersey, upon conviction.
