NDLEA: Time to stand together

Jonah Jang, now a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria once remarked that holding public office in Nigeria was a burden “because every public office holder is perceived to be a thief”. That scenario appears to be playing out at the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA, where Col. Muhammad Mustapha Abdallah has held sway as Chairman since 11 January 2016. A faceless group has been writing petitions and making wild allegations against him. Restating all the allegations in this short piece will elevate the writers and their intentions to some level of nobility.

Suffice it to say that since it was established by Decree Number 48 of January 1990 to eliminate the growing, processing, manufacturing, selling, exporting and trafficking of hard drugs, the NDLEA has had an intriguing history, with one of its chief executives having to leave office in a hurry, while another, Bello Lafiaji, was falsely accused of conspiracy and conversion of 164,300 Euros seized from a drug suspect in November 2005 when he was the Chairman of the NDLEA. He was sentenced to four years in prison on 21 June 2010, but upon appeal had his conviction upturned by the Court of Appeal on 22 November 2011. Those familiar with the drug war are therefore not surprised that individuals and groups often try to tarnish the names of NDLEA officials. In the usual Nigerian parlance, overheated drug barons and their collaborated are the ones fighting back, obviously because of Abdallah’s determination to make life unbearable for drug merchants.

Against all odds, and in spite of the dangers associated with their job, gallant officers of the NDLEA have continued to hold out against drug barons and addicts. Since Abdallah’s assumption of office the agency arrested 13, 293 suspected drug offenders and successfully prosecuted 2, 803 of them. In 2016 alone, the agency seized 267,574.45 kilogrammes of illicit drugs with cannabis sativa accounting for 187,394 kilogrammes, followed by 77,765.18 kilogrammes of psychotropic substances, 1,325.55 kilogrammes of methamphetamine and 718.27 kilogrammes of ephedrine. Cocaine accounted for 305.17 kilogrammes while heroine accounted for 66.28 kilogrammes of the seized drugs. Between January and June 2017, the NDLEA also seized 370, 399.6 kilograms of prohibited drugs, made up of 76.5238 kilograms of cocaine, 44.5313 kilograms of heroin and 25.24 kilograms of methamphetamine. Others are 26.2 kilograms of ephedrine, 12, 942.47 kilograms of sundry psychotropic substances, while cannabis sativa accounted for 357, 284.29 kilograms.

The agency also adopted two other measures, tracing the roots of the drugs and destroying them and educating people on the dangers of drug abuse. Through a programme, Operation Thunderstorm, more than 5,000 hectares of cannabis plantations were located and destroyed by the Agency, to ensure that they were not harvested and moved into the illicit drug market. The agency also discovered a laboratory in Enugu State where methamphetamine, a highly addictive substance that affects the central nervous system and gives its user a false sense of well-being and energy; about 20 kilograms of the drug that was found in the laboratory were destroyed.

In the area of anti-drug education and awareness, the Chairman of the NDLEA intensified efforts and the agency conducted 241 programmes with 53,025 students in attendance. The agency also conducted 52 awareness programmes for out-ofschool youths; about 13,121 youths participated in the programmes. Also, 41 community-based programmes were conducted with 14,995 as participants, just as two others were conducted for 403 prison inmates as well as d 32 others conducted in work places where 6,533 people attended. The awareness programme also captured 201 personnel of paramilitary agencies, members of the National Association of Proprietary and Patent Medicine Dealers.

Despite the obvious challenges, the NDLEA has been very proactive in the war against drugs, especially in the past two years. What Abdallah and his officers need from Nigerians is cooperation and support. Rather than regard the drug war as their war, Nigerians should regard it as everybody’s war. Together, Nigerians can win this war. Nats Onoja Agbo, Abuja.