Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has said that he could have been a drug addict and urged Nigerian youths and students to abstain from the use and abuse of psychoactive drugs.
According to Obasanjo, those substances add no value to life but destroy it.
He spoke in Abeokuta, Ogun State, at the second edition of ‘Fly Above The High’, an anti-drug campaign conference organised by the Recovery Advocacy Network.
With particular mention of those already into drug addiction but do not know how to quit, Obasanjo charged such African youths to speak out, stressing that failure to seek help would only lead them to an untimely death.
This is just as an ex-drug addict, Dr Abubakar Salami, advocated that Africans, particularly the Nigerian society, must desist from stigmatising the already identified drug addicts but show love and mentorship as the only panacea for a drug-free environment.
The former president warned in his speech at the second edition of the Supporting the Movement Against Drug Abuse Summit, organised by the Recovery Advocacy Network and held at the weekend in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital.
Obasanjo, at the event, themed: “Fly Above The High”, described drug abuse as “destructive” and also lamented the growing challenge of drug abuse in sub-Saharan Africa, stressing that the trend has grown worse within the last 10 years.
He called on youths who have challenges with drug abuse not to hide it but to seek help to get out of the catastrophic effects of addiction, which include untimely death.
“While serving as the Chairman of the West African Drug Commission under the auspices of the Kofi Annan Foundation, we were nine on the commission, and we went around West Africa with the belief that we were free from drugs which come mainly from Latin America and go to North America and Europe”.
“I talk about drugs with a sense of sobriety. As the Chairman of the West African Drug Commission under the Kofi Annan Foundation, I learned that West Africa is not just a transit point for drugs but has also become a centre of consumption”.
“But to our dismay, displeasure and pain, at the end of the exercise, we found out that West Africa has equally been a centre for drug consumption in a terrible way. That was more than 10 years ago, so the situation has worsened. And whatever applies to West Africa applies to all other parts of Africa.”
Obasanjo lamented the havoc drugs cause in the lives of the youths, declaring that addiction to hard drugs is a form of a self-inflicted disease that is curable only when the victim speaks out.
“If you have made the mistake of getting addicted through anyone, the answer is ‘don’t hide, seek help, and if you make efforts, you can get out of it”.
“Some diseases cannot be cured but could be managed. I have been living with diabetes for over 40 years, and I am still here by the grace of God. I watch what I eat; I stick to my doctor’s advice. So, people with addiction should not hide it; they should seek help before it is too late”.
The former President called on the people to support those who have gone into drugs and are willing to come out of it, adding that saying a word of prayer for them as well could prove to be the turning point.
Obasanjo, however, advocated against the societal stigmatisation of those who have already been addicted to drugs, saying, “I don’t believe that any disease should be seen as a stigma. I do not believe that there is every human being that is 100 per cent healthy. Some diseases cannot be cured, they can only be managed”.
Speaking in an interview, an ex-drug addict, Dr Salami, who is a drug survivor and Vice President of Recovery Advocacy Network, Dr Abubakar Salami recounted the experience of his addiction and eventual liberation, said with only love and mentorship, “We can bring these addicts out of that dark place”.
“The first point is to know and acknowledge that you have a problem; agreeing that being into drugs is a sickness. Once you have identified an ailment, you can seek help through the rehabilitation centre or through spiritual means of praying and fasting to overcome it.
“However, it is not too good for society to stigmatise them at all because such drives them further into addiction. When society says that person is wrong, he accepts that he is terrible, and that is it. Therefore, we need to learn not to stigmatise but to help these victims.
“There are two things that changed mine: love and prayers. With love and mentorship, we can bring these addicts out of that dark place”.
“Many people are lost in that place but don’t know there is a way out. Some people have given up on trying to get out, so we are saying there is a way out if you desire one without going to the rehabilitation centre”.
“By yourself, you can get out of that dark place; just understand how and how to avoid things that trigger you into going to it”.
Also, in another interview, the President of the Recovery Advocacy Network, Dr Kunle Adesina, called for robust legislation to curb the menace of drug availability in the country. At the same time, everyone must also take ownership of the fight against drug abuse.
“My call to the government would be that at a primordial level of prevention, there’s a need for strong legislation against substance abuse because these substances are not supposed to be available; the availability is much in our environment, and the government needs to legislate to reduce this drug demand in our society. And the government should make sure that those legislations are implemented.”
“Addiction treatment is best approached through prevention. We must focus on primordial and primary prevention levels to educate young people about the dangers of substance use before they start”.
Adesina, a psychiatric doctor, explained that the last report on drug abuse in Nigeria revealed that about 14. 3 million people have used one substance or another in the previous six months, while it has also been discovered that one out of every five users of drugs is a female, confirming that girls are also getting entangled in the web of drug abuse.
He said there is a need for sensitisation to step up campaigns against drug and substance abuse in the country.
