FORMER President Olusegun Obasanjo has urged Nigerian youths and students to abstain from the use and abuse of psychoactive drugs, saying 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’, anti-drug campaign conference organised by the Recovery Advocacy Network.
Obasanjo who bemoaned the growing menace of drug use Nigeria and West Africa, called for a restraint among the youths.
The Ota-farmer recalled how his tenure as the Chairman of the West African Drug Commission under the Kofi Annan Foundation, made him to learn that West Africa is not just a transit point for drugs but has also become a centre of consumption.
He said members of the commission crisscrossed West Africa with the belief that the region was free from drugs, which he said, came mainly from Latin America and go to North America and Europe.
“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 very bad way. That was more than 10 years ago, so the situation has since gone worse. And whatever applies to West Africa applies to all other parts of Africa,” Obasanjo said.
He also recalled how he embraced smoking as a young man but severe coughing made him ran away from it.
“If I had persisted, I could have become addicted. Once you get involved, it is difficult to get out,” Obasanjo told the gathering of youths, students and mental health specialists and policy makers.
The former president insisted that “There’s nothing drug can do for you except destruction.”
He urged those already addicted to psychoactive drugs to seek help and warned the society against stigmatization.
In his address, the Managing Director of Serenity Royale Hospital, Dr. Kunle Adesina, revealed that about 14.3 million Nigerians, representing 14.3% of the population, have used a substance within the last six months adding that one in five drug users is female.
“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 advised.
He called for strong legislation to reduce the availability of drugs, noting that the widespread accessibility of substances fuels the growing crisis.
A mental health specialist, Dr. Samuel Abah, said “From our experience we discovered that even those that are meant to control the substance are the one involved.
“We must stand our ground that this thing is not helpful, it’s destructive. It’s not just a pleasure but a destructive pleasure.”