STATEMENT ON INTERNATIONAL DAY AGAINST DRUG ABUSE AND ILLICIT TRAFFICKING BY THE HON ISSIFU MAHMOUD ESQ, MP FOR BINDURI CONSTITUENCY

June 26, has been proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 1987, as a day to remind countries across the globe about the debilitating impact of drug abuse and the illicit trafficking, calling on all of us to take deliberate action to stem its devastating tides. The relevance of the theme for this year’s commemoration “The Evidence is Clear: Invest in Prevention” is timely and instructive within the context of what we are witnessing of drug abuse and its raving impact in our communities.

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Drug abuse and illicit trafficking remains a persistent threat to the Ghanaian society: the menace is destroying families, eroding the moral fabric of our youth and future generations, fuelling crime in our communities and burdening our health infrastructure and budget as a country. The fight against drug abuse and illicit trafficking is not one for the government alone, but a shared responsibility across the segments of our society involving families, communities, civil society, individuals and the media.

The Ghanaian story may not be markedly different from its peers across the continent, where we are witnessing worrying trends of rising addiction among young people, increasing availability of synthetic and hard drugs, the activities of local as well as international trafficking networks exploiting the vulnerabilities of our young people. As a country with a youthful population, the challenges of drug abuse and illicit trafficking conspires to undermine our national development pace, it actually compromises our peace and security as a country. Laws or criminal justices operations and policies alone will not sufficiently resolve the menace. We must be concerned about intentionally addressing the social drivers of drug abuse and illicit trafficking, drivers such as poverty, unemployment, trauma, lack of opportunities and ensuring that every citizen, especially our young people, have access to the support and education they need to make informed choices in their lives.

Government of Ghana, under H.E John Dramani Mahama remains very committed to the development and empowerment of young people, and therefore is marshaling the required determination to fight drug abuse and illicit trafficking on all fronts. The strategy of the reset agenda in preventing this menace of drug abuse and illicit tracking in this regard revolves around a strong inter-agency collaboration, where the ministry of health and all other relevant agencies including border and port authorities have been activated and placed on the lookout these drugs, their peddlers and collaborators across the country.

The government is also investing in youth empowerment programs such as “ADWUMAWURA”, “the One-Million Coders Program”, “Youth Apprenticeship program” and the various youth employment modules being rolled out by the Youth Employment Agency (YEA), all of these initiatives are intentional aiming at rechanneling the passion and energies of our young people into productive ventures. The government is also looking at mainstreaming community initiatives of volunteer groups against drug abuse especially the recent initiative started by youths in Nima, we shall strive to ensure that such initiatives operates with regular state security supervision and within the confines of due process of law.

I wish to call on all Ghanaians especially, we the members of this house to use this day to pause and reflect on the devastations that the problem of drug abuse and illicit tracking wrecks on our young people and join me to say NO to Drugs/Drug Abuse, No to trafficking, and YES to the protection of the LIFE, the HEALTH and the DIGNITY of our young people.

Thank you.