Classy water plans to sue over closing

Belaya Industrial PLC which sold bottled water under the brand name “Classy,” has been closed, against their will, for the last two weeks. Now they plan to sue the Ministry of Trade.
The company, located near Suluta in Oromia Zone, was closed by the Ministry over concerns with the quality of their water. The company has responded by saying the lab results are unreasonable.
The Ethiopia Conformity Assessment (ECA) gave a letter to the company saying there was no problem with the quality of their water.
However, the Ministry says a lab test that they took four months ago failed to meet the required total plate count. A plate count test basically looks at all the organisms in the water and determines if it is safe to consume.
Dagne Yesegat, owner of the company said the decision is unfair and cost 270 workers their jobs.
“We were going to export our water but now we have been shut down, I don’t understand how two government agencies can come up with two separate quality assessments.”
Dagne went on to say that it was unfair for the announcement of the problem to go to the media before it went to them and they plan to sue unless they are allowed to re-open.
Kasshaun Mulat, Trade Inspection Director for the Ministry of Trade told Capital that the company was closed after several warnings.
“We have been sending them letters for two years and they have not adjusted the quality. They may have gotten assurance from ECA but that doesn’t have anything to do with the quality results in our laboratory.”
Belaya Industrial PLC was producing 24,000 bottles of water per day in various sizes. The company was established four years ago with an investment of 13 million birr. Its factory is on 20,000sqm. They sourced their water from Entoto Mountain.