Worried by the increasing involvement of married women and ladies in drug abuse, hundreds of women in Katsina have staged a peaceful rally to raise awareness on the ills of the habit on the addicts and the society at large.
The campaign was organised by the state Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development as part of measures to fight drug abuse in the state.
The protesters carried placards with various inscriptions including “Think Health Not Drugs”, “Mothers Say No to Drug Abuse”, “Illicit Drug is Dangerous”, “We Must Support Government to Win the War Against Drug Abuse”, among others.
The march past, Kano Chronicle observed, took off from Kofar Durbi through Nagogo road and terminated at Kofar Soro, emir’s palace. The campaign was attended by top government officials, members of civil society organisations and religious leaders.
According to a 2017 statistics released by the Katsina state Command of the National Drugs Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), students and married women top the chat of drug abuse in the state.
The report showed that during the year under review over 50 students, 13 females and 20 teenagers were arrested by the agency, while a total of 432kg of illicit substances including 246.7kg of cannabis, 185.2kgs of psychotropic substances and 997 bottles of cough syrup and codeine were seized.
Irked by the development, the state government, through the ministry of women affairs launched the awareness rally and house-house campaign in order to educate women and youths on the dangers associated to drug abuse in the state with a view to addressing the menace.
Addressing the rally, the state’s Commissioner of Women Affairs, Dr Badiyya Mashi said the sensitization was organised to address the ugly trend, noting that the ministry had shouldered the responsibility of taking the fight to all knocks and corners in the state.
Dr Badiyya said Katsina state government, in collaboration with NDLEA, NAFDAC and other relevant federal government’s agencies, would clampdown on all unlicensed pharmacists and patent medicine stores.
She also assured that operators of such business outfits would be arrested and prosecuted before a court of law.
“Women and mothers must be seen to be doing the right thing especially with regards to the upbringing of their wards. Parents should know who their wards hang out with and what they do in their private times that is why the ministry organised a houses-houses campaign to educate parents,” she said.
She said state working committee on drug abuse should be reactivated and replicated in local governments and wards across the state to fish out women involved in drug abuse and rehabilitate them.
Dr Mashi reiterated that the state government was committed to the ongoing fight against sales and consumption of illicit drugs in the state and would support any ministry, agency and or parastatal willing to partake in the fight.
On her part, the state Commander, NDLEA, Hajiya Maryam Sani said it was worrisome that the number of women and ladies engaged in drug abuse was increasing in the state, lamenting that government and other relevant stakeholders must do something urgent to address the situation.
“We have realised that the women drugs addicts usually send children to buy the drugs for them. Also, women hawkers who deal in drugs take them to the door steps of the addicts inside their matrimonial homes,” she said.
The Chairperson of Queen Dijah Women and Children Awareness Initiative, Miss Khadijat Saulawa, however attributed the increasing involvement of married women in drug abuse to the attitude of their husbands particularly abandonment and space creation.
She said husbands, nowadays, no longer find time to stay with their wives and as such boredom and loneliness played a vital role in women involvement in drug abuse, saying, “If husbands can stay with their wives more often, I am sure the women will stop the habit of taking drugs.
“Try this and see if she won’t reduce. These depressed women easily get convinced by friends to take drugs to ease their boredom and loneliness and so they take up to it,” she said.
She further suggested that traditional and religious leaders should also be involved in the crusade against drug abuse in addition to the massive awareness, engagement with students, women groups and visitations to suspected homes of drugs addicts.
Kano Chronicle gathered that a new rehabilitation center was set for commissioning to help reintegrate drugs addicts into the society.
