Fighting drug abuse requires a holistic approach – Former DG NDLEA

The United Nations Office on Drug and Crimes (UNODC) has said that 14.4 percent of Nigerians are presently engaged in drug abuse.

For the most part of 2021, communities in South Eastern Nigeria faced the dangerous effect of Methamphetamine nicknamed by the youths as Nkpuru Mmiri which translates to seed of water. And worried by the fact that substance abuse is a major problem facing the North, the Coalition of 52 Northern Groups, CNG, announced its partnership with relevant stakeholders to unveil a community-based initiative aimed at rehabilitating youths struggling with drug abuse and addiction in the region. CNG’s Director of Strategic Communication, Samaila Musa, the programme would also provide empowerment schemes for drug addicts, thereby driving the economic recovery of the Northern region and the country. Presently, it is estimated that 75 percent of hard drug users in our society are adversely affected.

Recently, Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA, Brig General Buba Marwa warned that the nation faces a grim future over the rate of drugs prevalence among youths wondering, “what will become of Nigeria with about 70% youth population if the future of its youths is ravaged by drugs.

Speaking while launching the War Against Drugs Abuse (WADA) Club at the University of Abuja, Marwa said, “Part of the measures to reduce drug use in universities is the proposed introduction of the Drug Integrity Test for both new and returning students.” This drug integrity test according to him is anticipated to metamorphose into an anti-drug policy for all higher institutions of learning in Nigeria.

Likewise, an NDLEA Director-General, Otunba Lanre Ipinmisho shared his experiences with Law & Society about youths struggling with substance abuse and proffered suggestions on the way forward.

“If you open my office bathroom door, you would see that it’s been broken several times by some boys that were brought here for counselling. So, I’m not talking of theory. I’m talking about something that I see and do all the time. One sat here, and said to me, ‘oh, you are a Sheik. Okay. But I’m God whom the Sheik prays to.’ The boy’s father was here crying. I insist on serious advocacy because there are many alternatives to the popularly known drugs and substances. During an advocacy campaign a parent once said, ‘ah, you have not mentioned Maggi yet (food seasoning). She said: ‘I caught my security guard with six cubes of Maggi from my kitchen and insisted he must tell me what he was going to do with them. He said they put it inside malt drink and it makes them get high.’ 

“Have I told you about old newspapers? From a stack or pile, just pick the ones underneath, light and smoke; it will get you high. What about, solution, petrol, smells emanating from the soak-away pit in the north? They actually crack open soak-away pits to inhale the odour. Zakami and lizard dung? This issue requires a more holistic approach. And what is the approach? What is it that will appeal to these children to listen to counselling on drug abuse? 

Now, on my own, I have been to all these universities around here; because I have seen prevalence, and what you see that confronts you is that almost every student carries a bottle and more than 70 percent of those bottles are not water. They contain mixtures of all sorts of things even if it appears clear like water.  Hence, it is not something we give ceremonial attention to and expect that we are solving problems. No. It requires more serious attention than that. 

“There is an inter-governmental agency on drug abuse which hardly meets now because they are not funded, it should be resuscitated so that if the Ministry of Health’s representative is talking from the angle of health other representatives will speak from the peculiarity of their own sector. Actually, it’s a health issue. It’s not a criminal matter. That is why people accuse law enforcement agents that they arrest people with cough syrup and fail to lock them up. No, they can’t lock him up because it’s not a criminal offence. The addict is someone who needs help. So, you need to take him to a rehab centre.”

Does the NDLEA have a rehab centre? 

No. They do not have. What they have are cells where they lock up people and say addicts have stopped using drugs and that they have started reading the Quran and the Bible. That is not how rehabilitation is done. A rehab centre is more comprehensive than we think in Nigeria. It is a more comprehensive thing than just locking someone up.

The first thing you do in rehab after the administrative step of registering the person is, he goes for a test and then for the talks.  When you finish with the talks, you put him in another place where he gradually tries to live without drugs. It’s a very difficult period. After that, you take him to the next step where he can look back because, during the talks, he really can’t look back. All that he is concerned about is where will he get the next drugs from. So, after 90 days, depending on each case on its own merit, you now release him and you still don’t leave him like that because this is someone who has been on drugs for years. 

How do you then cut the demand in the instant situation?

Parents have serious roles to play. When we were growing up as children, there were children that smoked the native mat. It has holes inside like cigarettes. You light it with matches and hide to smoke. Why were we hiding in those days? Because we knew that we must not be seen.  Parents’ availability for the upbringing of their children is very key to fighting drugs. As we speak now, there are children that will never touch alcohol because they see that in their home, it is an abomination. They have never even bothered to ask why, but they know that it is a no-go-area. Whereas there are homes where each of these boys have cartons of cough syrup and codeine and no parent has entered the room, and he knows that no one is going to enter and therefore needs not to be careful. Even the type of cars these children ride has all the equipment for smoking marijuana. It is just for you to look in one day and see what your son is doing. 

How many of these children have dropped out of school for several years and they keep lying. There was a couple that went to see their child in the UK. They didn’t prepare for the shock that they got. They went with a colleague from their office to check on the boy. The school authorities said they had no student by that name. Meanwhile, he had called the preceding week telling them how well he was doing at school. Eventually, they got a Nigerian who had finished from the school about three years earlier. He said, ‘yes, this boy was with us.

He didn’t finish and he has been rusticated, though I can get somebody who knows where they smoke.’ By the time the father got there, of course, he didn’t even recognise the father.  That was all they got for all the thousands of pounds sterling they have been sending to England.  Parents need to pay more attention to their children. They think that they could use money and material things to buy off the children. The moment they see the child is unhappy, they pump in more money, and his friends are already aware that he is the supplier of money. And one thing with drugs is that the more, the merrier.

You can’t stay in your room and be making the wild dances alone. It won’t make sense unless they are people who are looking at you.  We used to have about 168 porous borders when I was at NDLEA. I don’t know but it must be more now. On these 168 porous routes, nobody would ask you, ‘where are you going or coming from?’ 

What is the way forward out of this problem?

We still require the Federal Government and private individuals to invest in rehabilitation centres. 

What is the role of religious and traditional institutions in the battle against drugs? 

In the north which I am more familiar with, the north has a terrible culture of silence. That has affected the religious organisations that are northern-based. When they have a problem, people in the north that constitute membership of those organisations, don’t discuss it. There is a culture of silence. In the north, they would rather gossip about a problem. And this they need to stop! You bring up children collectively so that everybody in the neighbourhood can have their peace. So, I believe the religious organisations are beginning to wake up to their own responsibilities with regard to drugs.

I have been going from one mosque to the other as well as from one traditional ruler to the other, trying to awaken them to the dangers of this problem. Luckily, the people I have spoken to have also been going through hard times with their children and wards on the issue.  You would see an Emir that is afraid of entering his own house because of the havoc drug is doing in the house. So, I believe a more holistic approach is for non-governmental agencies to wake up and for relevant government agencies to wake up to their responsibility. But how would they wake up to their responsibilities when the government is not treating it as a matter of priority? Admission into universities now should include tests for drugs.  University authorities should insist that students, who test positive to drugs, should go and clean up, and then come back. 

Why did you say earlier that drug addicts are not criminals? 

No. They are not criminals; because the law says that there must be action backed by intention. How would you convince a law court that somebody who is a drug addict has an intention to commit a crime? He cannot form an intention. Secondly, the United Nations had long come to the conclusion that it is a medical issue. Though it may be behavioural, it’s a medical challenge.