Mrs Obot Bassey, the Commander of the Nationwide Drug Regulation Enforcement Company (NDLEA) in Akwa Ibom, has decried the excessive charge of drug abuse within the state.
Bassey gave the remarks throughout the 2025 Feast of Barracuda in Eket on Monday, with the theme: ‘Excessive value of getting excessive: Unmasking the true worth of drug abuse’.
The Information Company of Nigeria (NAN) experiences that the Nationwide Affiliation of Seadogs (NAS), also called Pyrates Confraternity, Atlantic Shores Deck, Eket chapter, sponsored the occasion.
Bassey, represented by Mr Ojukwu Obidi, the Space Commander, Eket command, stated that the extent of drug abuse within the state was alarming.
“In Akwa Ibom alone, the speed of drug abuse could be very excessive.
“Nowhere I’ve been to, that I have seen the variety of mentally challenged those who I can examine to what I’ve seen in Akwa Ibom.
“Drug abuse is alarming in Akwa Ibom as a result of some indigenes have normalised the utilization, they see it as nothing, they see it as a method of selling the economic system and sustaining themselves,” Bassey stated.
She lamented that younger adults took a substance popularly often known as ‘mix’, including that mix was made up of Marijuana and alcohol, which may result in psychological well being challenges.
“In case you go to social gatherings in Akwa Ibom, hardly you’ll not see younger adults taking ‘mix’ and you realize that their genetics are totally different, which leads lots of them endure from psychological breakdown,” she stated.
The State Commander stated that NDLEA had seized over 804 kg of laborious medicine in 2025 alone and convicted 38 people who find themselves presently serving their sentences.
“This 12 months alone, now we have arrested 312 suspects in Akwa Ibom. In case you have a look at the folks now we have arrested already, the associated fee to their households and communities are very excessive,” she stated.
In response to her, violent crimes are rising, resembling kidnapping, rape, and armed theft, attributable to drug abuse.
Bassey appealed to the affiliation to help the company in logistics to hold out their mandate successfully.
She stated that a part of the company’s weekly programmes was embarking on sensitisation to disabuse the minds of individuals of drug abuse within the state.
Bassey additionally expressed dissatisfaction that the nation is dropping its younger ones to medicine.
She thanked the affiliation and NDLEA for the drug advocacy to cut back the nationwide disaster being confronted within the nation attributable to drug abuse.
In his welcome speech, Idongesit Ifon, the President of NAS, Pyrates Confraternity Atlantic Shores Deck, Eket, stated any member caught peddling or utilizing medicine can be expelled.
“My members don’t get contain in medicine, anybody that’s caught, can be expelled from the affiliation,” Ifon stated.
The President stated this 12 months’s theme was not solely well timed however pressing.
Ifon stated the nation and communities had been witnessing the corrosive results of drug abuse from shattered lives and damaged households to rising crime, poor psychological well being and weakened establishments.
“It’s a rising menace that calls for collective consciousness and deliberate, strategic intervention,” he stated.
He stated that the fish barracuda was a feared predator, swift, crafty and harmful, including that it lurks beneath the floor, hanging at will and making the waters unsafe.
“However when the barracuda is caught, when it’s subdued. It’s a second of triumph and celebration as a result of peace returns to the waters,” Ifon stated.
Ifon, whereas talking on the feast of barracuda, stated that it had come to symbolise all of the ills, injustices and forces of oppression that threaten the attainment of a simply and egalitarian society.
He urged the folks to interact totally, listening, studying, asking questions, and difficult, because the battle in opposition to drug abuse requires all arms to be on deck.
“Let the feast mark a turning level in our shared battle to guard the susceptible, uplift our youth and restore dignity to our society,” he stated.
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