Marwa seeks drug tests for youth corps members
As part of the war against drug abuse, the Chairman/Chief Executive of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (retd), has called for a mandatory drug test for youth corps members as they report for national service at the various orientation camps across the country.
Marwa made the call when he hosted the Director General of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), Brig. Gen. Mohammed Fadah, who led his management team on a courtesy visit to the NDLEA headquarters, in Abuja, yesterday.
In a statement by the agency’s Director, Media and Advocacy, Mr. Femi Babafemi, yesterday, the NDLEA chief painted a picture of Nigeria’s drug problem with facts and figures from the 2018 national drug survey, while calling for collective efforts to change the narrative.
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Marwa said: “There is a need for drug tests for our youth corps members as they report at the orientation camps. Once they know there’ll be drug tests at the camps, they will abstain from it.”
The whole essence is to ensure help gets to those who test positive early. This is part of our War Against Drug Abuse (WADA) initiative.
“Nigeria has a drug issue. We’re determined to ensure this is changed, but we can’t do it alone; we need organisations like NYSC to reduce and control demand for drugs. Nigeria has insufficient rehabilitation and counselling centres.
We need counselling centres in the primary health care centres at the grassroots, where we don’t have enough manpower to cover, and this is where the young men and women of NYSC come in. We can train them in their numbers to serve as counsellors at the grassroots level, because the majority of drug users only need counselling.”
Earlier, Brig. Gen. Fadah said he came on the visit to appreciate NDLEA for past support to the scheme and, also, ask for further collaboration as NYSC prepares to open the gates of orientation camps across the country.
