The Chairman/Chief Executive of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) Col. Mohammad Mustapha Abdallah (retd.) has alerted Nigerians over increasing drug addiction among the citizens and attributed it to increasing drug trafficking and money laundering in the West African sub-region, which is part of about $85 billion global illicit drug trade.
Abdallah made the disclosure in Abuja at the weekend while presenting the programme of activities in commemoration of the 2017 International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking.
“In West Africa, the $85 billion global cocaine trade is exacerbating addiction and money laundering while fuelling political instability and threats to security. Every $1 billion of pure cocaine trafficked through West Africa earns more than 10 times as much as when sold on the street in Europe. We have cause to worry over the increasing conversion of jurisdictions such as our neighboring African countries into transit routes to Europe and Asia because some of these illicit drugs will no doubt find their way through the porous borders to our hinterland into cities for local consumption”.
The NDLEA Boss said the theme of the event indicated that listening to children and youth is the first step to help them grow healthy and safe, noting that it is through listening that parents could properly appreciate the salient factors that account for indulgence in drugs and it is through such understanding that strategies could be suitably counter and prevent drug challenges.
He said the Nigerian government has displayed sufficient political will to address the drug menace, adding that the agency had observed that the social investment policy thrust of the federal government coupled with the laudable initiatives in agriculture would profitably engage the youths who are vulnerable group in substance abuse, thereby de-escalating the problem of drug trafficking and abuse.
Abdallah said that there was a marginal decline in both the arrests and seizures of drugs by the agency in 2016.
“The agency arrested a total of 8,257 suspected drug traffickers comprising 7,720 males and 537 females in 2016. Illicit drugs weighing 263,947.57kg were also seized. The drugs include 305.166kg of cocaine, 66.283kg of heroin, 187,394kg of cannabis, 1,352.56kg of methamphetamine, 718.265kg of ephedrine and 74,111.30kg of other sundry drugs. However, in 2015 suspected drug traffickers arrested were 8,778 consisting of 8,143 males and 635 females while 903,624kg of drugs were seized. Comparatively, there was a reduction of 521 persons in the number of arrests made in 2016 while drug seizures also reduced by 639,677kg. This reduction is due to the updated strategies adopted by the Agency in preventing cannabis cultivation as cannabis seizure alone in 2015 was 871,480kg” he stated.
The NDLEA Chief Executive also said that the drug war was taken to the cannabis plantations leading to the destruction of 718.78 hectares far above the 377.12 hectares discovered in 2015. Correspondingly, the number of drug cases favourably determined in favour of the Agency in court increased with 559 from 1,690 in 2015 to 2,249 in 2016.
Abdallah therefore advocated a drug control model adopted by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) where a task force was constituted to coordinate and strengthen responses to illicit drugs and organised crimes by incorporating them into all UN peace keeping, peace building, security, development and disarmament programmes. This model can be domesticated to cover peace building activities in the country.
The NDLEA Boss admitted that although the task before it is daunting, but the agency promised to fast track her strategies by collaborating with stakeholders, noting that government has a responsibility to counteract both drug trafficking and abuse but communities could also make major contributions.
He said families, schools, civil society and religious organisations could do their part to rid their communities of drugs.
