Guardian NG
Chairman/Chief Executive of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Brig. Gen. Buba Marwa (rtd) has linked the success recorded by the agency in the fight against illicit drugs in the country to ongoing reforms within the agency.
Marwa said the NDLEA has been undergoing a reform process which he said has resulted in the arrest of many drug lords and their cartels.
He stated this on Wednesday at the 14th Biennial International Conference on Drugs, Alcohol, and Society in Africa with the theme “Towards the Reform of Drug Law and Policy in Africa: Research, Practice and Advocacy Consideration” organised by the Centre for Research and Information on Substance Abuse (CRISA) in Abuja.
He said: “Revamping NDLEA became imperative in light of the disturbing findings of the National Drug Use and Health Survey conducted in 2018 which indicated that Nigeria’s drug use prevalence at 14.4% was way above the global threshold of 5.6%.
“In the past 21 months, NDLEA has been undergoing a reform process which has resulted in tectonic changes in the Agency’s administration, structure and operations.
Consequently, NDLEA’s turbo-charged performance in the areas of arrests, prosecutions, convictions and seizures is the result of reforms”.
According to him, the reforms are not limited to NDLEA’s activities but include the laws that established the agency and other legislations that are the basis for the country’s drug control effort.
He added that the reforms, singly and collectively, have given the agency a dynamic drug control framework in which prevention and treatment are now entrenched.
Stressing the need for reforms in drug laws, including policies and their implementations, Marwa recalled that until the past few years, drug law enforcement in Nigeria was tied to dated legislation with the resultant policies and practices he observed, no longer adequate to tackle issues of illicit substances…
