Taming the monster: Experts speak on how govt can tackle drug abuse among youths

Drug abuse among youths has become a global problem but who is to blame? KOLA OYELERE and AYODELE AJOGE report that there are several factors responsible for the increasing abuse of drugs by youths, especially in a society with receding life-enhancing values like Nigeria.

Recently, the federal government banned codeine, a substance that has become widely abused by youths across the country. Though many Nigerians have commended the step, several others still wondered why lots of other substances similarly abused have remained unbanned. Many of the critics also wondered why the federal government took the step only after the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) aired a documentary entitled “Sweet, sweet, codeine” despite Nigerian news media having had to focus on the trending anti-social addiction many times and the danger of a perpetually inebriated youth population.

However the question arises: why has getting high on drugs suddenly become widely practised among the youths across the country? Sunday Tribune spoke with a cross section of experts while trying to unravel the mystery of drugs addiction among the nations’ young population. Investigations revealed that the menace is not gender sensitive, while the blame could be placed squarely at the doorsteps of politicians, the community, parents and government as well as  globalisation and even the youths themselves.

According to Professor Tukur Muhammad Baba, Head of Department of Sociology, Federal University, Birnin-Kebbi, Kebbi State, one of the reasons the youth are hooked or obsessed with getting high is the effect of globalisation, in which case what is currently happening in the United Kingdom or any part of the world could be found even in the smallest village in Nigeria. Thus if drug abuse is now common worldwide, it should not be surprising to find it all over the country too.

“Physical boundaries in the world are becoming surmountable, if I can put it that way, with devices that have become increasingly common, increasingly cheap, increasingly wide spread in their application and use. In the rural areas of Kebbi, Taraba and Oyo states you see youths dancing the way they do in the ghettoes of America; that is a problem we are facing.

“This globalisation is also making nonsense of us; narcotics like cocaine and codeine are brought across the borders. They are easily available and affordable. If there is supply, the demand is easily available,” Professor Baba said.

The sociologist also mentioned other contributory factors to drug abuse among the youth as depression, frustration, and unemployment, among others, noting that: “if they can get what will make them to temporarily forget about their sorrow, they go for it.” He added that the problem is worst in the northern part of the country as dwindling opportunities and social inequalities grow ever more than before.

Though harsh economic situation is general to all parts of the country, Baba believes that the peculiar economic situation in the North of the country contributes immensely, noting that basically, economic transformation in that part of the country is very low and very frustrating.

“Few people are getting stupendously rich from all kinds of involvements, for example in drugs and in politics. The vast majority of the people are getting impoverished more and more and finding it difficult to cope day and night. It is putting pressure on families, putting pressure on individuals while the easy way out is through drugs.

“We only depend on agriculture and agriculture is labourious. Youths are running away from it and there is no change in the past 250 years. We still use hoe and cutlass as major implements; so the next thing is for the youths to take to drugs and our leaders are not paying attention to this,” he said.

A criminologist, Dr Bello Ibrahim, of the department of Sociology, Bayero University, Kano shares Baba’s view on the socio-economic factors, but adds that it is a global problem. According to him, “if you look at it now the issue of drug addiction is not only in the country, it is a global issue. This can be attributed to the fall in global economy. This actually created that particular avenue for many individuals to engage in drug abuse.”

Dr Ibrahim is also of the view that the process of socialisation and family values through which the younger generation is brought up is changing, that is if it has not broken down completely. He noted that families are no longer teaching the youth to cope with the realities, coupled with lack of proper supervision and control. Even communal life occasioned by modernisation according to him has been eroded and this has made the youth to become defiant and anti social in their behaviour.

Professor  Baba sees a disconnect between what used to be in the education of children years back and what obtains today, linking it with how children become deviants in their behaviours.

“In those days children don’t go to school until about age of seven, but nowadays they go to school too early at age two and three, thereby losing close relationship with their uncles and aunties, whereas the schools they attend do not inculcate the right kind of relationship in them.

“But now what do we have? First of all children are taken early to school which is nursery; now we have pre-nursery which means by the age of two the child loses contact with the primary group  – grandparents, uncles and aunties. In their formal school there is no emotional involvement, there is no moral involvement and upbringing. There is no correction.

“At that early age, they start to relate with teachers, not uncles, not grandmas. In those days, grandma and aunties will come and demand for the child to come and stay with them for few years. We have disconnected from the basic moral institutions where they learn skills, where they learn their culture, tradition; where they were told to relate to people.

“So you have divorced  the child from formal civilisation and one of the most critical impact of an individual is primary socialisation; primary socialisation takes place first of all within the family. This is where the child gets the basic skills to relate with people to have a home. When I say home, it is more than physical environment,” Baba explained.

Both Baba and Dr. Ibrahim also identified lack of government regulations, weak enforcement of the law is weak, poor funding of the law enforcement agencies, have also been identified as reason for availability of the drugs and the ability of the youths to obtain them without hindrance. They also blame politicians, religious leaders, university teachers, students are all part of the problem.

“Students come to the classroom with bottles of soft drinks but inside them is codeine; we know all these but pretend as if we don’t know. But some of us don’t care. When you have people who are supposed to be role models and are in support of this, my friend we are in a big problem and the problem would continue,” said Baba.

What then is the way out?

According to Dr Ibrahim, drug users must be punished just as poverty must be tackled head-on by engaging the youth in their schools, providing job opportunities for the unemployed and government must make sure that the youth are generally motivated towards greater things in life. He is also of the opinion that there is need for attitudinal revolution within the society.

“As long as there is economic hardship, there will be problem in that particular system; therefore this must be properly addressed. Sources of hard drugs must be blocked. Our country’s borders have to be given proper monitoring,” he stated.