The Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA and the Federal Ministry of Education on Wednesday, reached an agreement for compulsory drug integrity tests for students of tertiary institutions and the review of the current secondary school curriculum to include drug education.
The agreement was reached when the NDLEA Chairman, Brig Gen Mohamed Buba Marwa (rtd) led a delegation of his management team to a meeting with the Minister of Education, Dr. Maruf Alausa in Abuja.
Marwa had during the meeting highlighted the devastating effect of substance abuse on the country’s youthful population, calling for concerted efforts in the fight against illicit drugs among the Nigerian youths.
He noted that the fight against illicit drugs is a fight for the souls of the Nigerian youth.
Marwa explained that the purpose of the visit was to seek collaboration with the ministry in the nation’s collective efforts towards drug control.
“Our focus basically will be on schools and educational institutions. There are millions of our children that are under the supervision of this ministry, and it’s very critical.
“The drug scourge, as we all know, is very high in Nigeria.
“So, we’re actually fighting for the souls of our children. Now, we also know that drug use is exacerbating criminal activities. That is, the Boko Haram, terrorism, banditry, and so on.
“We know that without drugs, they wouldn’t be able to do what they are doing, because they wouldn’t do all these criminal activities in their right senses.
“So, in our own way, we are contributing to the fight against insecurity in the country,” he said.
The NDLEA boss revealed that through law enforcement actions, his agency has continued to deal mortal blows to the drug cartels, through the seizures, arrests, convictions, and asset forfeiture.
According to him, supported by President Bola Tinubu, within the last two years, the agency has made arrests of 40,887 criminal elements, gotten 8,682 convicted and seized 5,507 metric tons of illicit drugs.
He revealed, “In fact, from January last year to the present, opioids, that’s tramadol mostly, that we have seized, are in excess of one billion pills, which is worth more than N1 trillion.”
While stating that the President is also supporting the Agency to build seven rehabilitation centres in addition to the existing 30 centres in NDLEA commands nationwide, Marwa noted that President Tinubu has also approved the construction of one model rehab centre in each of the geo-political zone in the country.
He listed three key areas he wants the Ministry and NDLEA to collaborate to effectively check the menace of substance abuse among Nigerian youths.
According to him, “the first suggestion we have is for a review of the drug education curriculum in secondary schools. Even though we’re told of the existence of this in the past but because of the complexity of drugs, the dynamism of it, and the new psychoactive substances that have come to play, we feel that it is time to consider a review of this drug education curriculum.
“Another area we were thinking of suggesting is to introduce stand-alone drug abuse prevention programmes in schools, secondary schools. Not the curriculum this time, but programmes that stand on their own, lectures, competitions, and involving the parents, and so on.
And then the third area we were thinking is to adopt a drug testing policy in tertiary institutions, because we want a policy to keep our campuses clean. Several vice chancellors have come on their own to seek both our guidance and participation in conducting drug tests for their students.
So, what we are suggesting now is drug tests for new students, for students returning from vacations, and random tests.
“This will make the children to avoid taking drugs, knowing fully well that if they do and they are found out, there will be consequences. And the consequences do not necessarily mean rustication.”
In his response, the Minister commended Marwa for his steadfastness and commitment to the service of Nigeria.
He noted that the drug scourge is a huge problem that must be tackled head-on.
The Minister said, “When the youths get into drugs, they won’t go to school and even when they go to school, they are not getting a functional education. And at the end of the day, what happens? Their level of critical thinking is lower.
“Their ability to make informed decisions in the later part of their life becomes significantly reduced. So, they become unemployable. And what happens? You now have that vicious cycle. They’re not functional. They’re not useful to themselves. All they do is resort to criminality. Once you use drugs, you’re likely to have a dysfunctional family. So, it’s a huge menace that we need to tackle, and tackle very quickly.”
Talking about the areas of collaboration, the Minister suggested the formation of a technical working group, inter-ministerial working group between the ministry and the NDLEA, revealing plans to create a Substance Use Prevention Unit in the ministry
The Minister also assured on getting two agencies under the Ministry, UBEC and TETFUND to partner with the NDLEA Academy, as part of efforts to deepen drug education in basic, secondary and tertiary institutions across the country.
Following the Minister’s directive, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry, Mr. Abel Oluwamuyiwa Enitan announced the take off of the new Substance Use Prevention Unit while giving the vote of thanks.
