Given the daily abuse of power by politicians and their aides, it has become imperative that they should all undergo drug tests, starting from the highest office to the lowest office. Perhaps there lies the secret of our revival as a country. It is indefensible that some policies in Nigeria at different levels of government emanated from equitable, balanced consciences. When some politicians drop aberrant policies across the country, demented aides go on to defend them before a bemused populace. Substance abuse may be responsible, and that is why I argue that politicians must undergo drug tests.
By Promise Adiele
In Nigeria, we always ask the question, “Are you on drugs?” when someone behaves in a way inconsistent with accepted social and human standards. These days, given the way some Nigerian politicians and their aides conduct themselves, we are forced to ask the all-important question, “Are they on drugs?” It is difficult to argue that some Nigerian politicians and their aides do not consume hard drugs. It is more difficult to contend that some of their aides do not inhale various illicit substances that impair their cognitive abilities. Or how can an enlightened mind explain the manifest neurotic tendencies by some politicians and their aides, which defy rationality? Every day, as events unfold in the country, the odds tilt towards affirming what we all suspect – that some of these politicians and their aides are not normal – their actions, utterances, and proclamations are drug or substance-induced. This is the only safe explanation to assuage agitated minds who continually ask questions about the mental state of Nigeria’s political class.
I have included political aides in the mix because their submissions on various media spaces defy reasonable explanation. Thus, it becomes increasingly difficult to associate them with stable psychological health and even more complex to attribute good intentions to their personalities. The consequence of having some hard drugs and substance-enabled persons making policies and shaping public opinion is tragic. It reflects in our chaotic, scrabbled socio-economic and political realities. Gradually, the body politic is subliminally affected and vulgarity is accepted as normal.
Hard drug or substance abuse is dangerous to any society. Beyond its continual inauguration of a mentally unstable clan, it destroys the lives of young people and amputates their dreams. Unfortunately, some people rose to material prominence as billionaires selling hard drugs and other banned substances. In fact, it is the only industry known to them. We sing their praises when they build mansions, empower people, and commit to rural development of some negligible heights. We all echo – long live our sons, they are doing well. Their money does not come in trickles. Their money comes in billions, and in hard currency too.
READ ALSO:
Customs, NDLEA set committee, agree to strengthen anti-Drug trafficking
Besides empowering people and initiating a few rural projects, their next destination is politics – a promiscuous industry that accommodates the intelligent, debased, and foolish. With the stupendous wealth, proceeds from hard drugs, they compromise and buy the devil on their way to acquiring power. With the magnetic stench of their overflowing resources, they recruit people who become their apostles. They extend the frontiers of schizophrenia and pollute public spaces with avarice and deception. Morality level drops abysmally. They enunciate a social order where integrity and accountability become scarce commodities. It is an era of “anything goes”.
When the chairman of the Nigerian Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Brig. General Buba Marwa (rtd) suggested that political parties and legislative bodies should include drug integrity tests in the screening requirements of political aspirants, many people opposed him. But the retired soldier was right. Currently, in Nigeria, applicants for civil service in Ministries, Departments and Agencies must undergo compulsory drug tests. Also, new students admitted to secondary schools and tertiary institutions must undergo compulsory drug tests. It is mandatory for recruits and serving personnel in the Nigerian Customs Service to undergo drug tests. It remains to be seen why the directive was only for new applicants for civil service and new students into schools, while serving civil servants and old students are spared.
Given the daily abuse of power by politicians and their aides, it has become imperative that they should all undergo drug tests, starting from the highest office to the lowest office. Perhaps there lies the secret of our revival as a country. It is indefensible that some policies in Nigeria at different levels of government emanated from equitable, balanced consciences. When some politicians drop aberrant policies across the country, demented aides go on to defend them before a bemused populace. Substance abuse may be responsible, and that is why I argue that politicians must undergo drug tests.
Do we really think it is normal for a police officer to kill a motorist because of N50? Do we think it is normal for soldiers to brutalize civilians unprovoked? Do we think it is normal for an aide of a politician to swallow his vomit and turn sixty degrees from an earlier position? Do we think it is normal for a politician to amass billions of funds that he does not need in his lifetime amidst excruciating poverty in society? Do we think it is normal for a politician to be drunk on power liquor and remain in office when his health fails to the point of international embarrassment?
Do we think it is normal for a governor to liquidate his state for eight years and go to the Senate for another eight years? No, I don’t think these realities are normal. Something must be responsible, and that is why I advocate for compulsory drug tests for some politicians and their aides. We must find a way of anchoring our doubts and confusions on something as an explanation for the various social and economic dereliction in our country. No one can convince me that some of our politicians and their aides are free from the influence of certain illicit substances.
The idea to proceed with party primaries when Nigerians are killed and beheaded in their country must be attributable to external influence. At a time when those in power should declare national mourning for the many lives lost and communities sacked across the country, they are celebrating while their aides are justifying their insensitivity. The video of that Mathematics teacher being beheaded in Oyo State should humble any power potentate. But no. It is time to celebrate emerging as the flag bearer of a political party in the 2027 election. These kinds of behaviour are not normal.
At a time when communities in some states are being sacked by terrorists and Nigerians are wiped out like cockroaches, some wielders of political power are more interested in their political ambition than responding to an urgent national emergency. It takes an extreme level of mental depravity for a political power holder to look away while innocent people are killed like wanton flies. The safe explanation could be abuse of some illicit substances and nothing more. My argument is informed by a consistent inquiry into finding an explanation for the fiendish attitude of some power wielders as a response to the country’s gradual annihilation by terrorists and economic hardship.
Recently, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime revealed that 10.6 million Nigerians abuse marijuana. Besides marijuana, there are other kinds of popular hard substances in Nigeria, such as cocaine for the big boys, heroin for the middle class, and methamphetamine for everyone. Synthetic opioids like tramadol and codeine are also very popular among Nigerian youths. I am more interested in the usage of these hard drugs among some politicians and their aides for obvious reasons. While the politicians make the laws, their aides defend them even if it means sacrificing their mothers for ritual purposes. The policies of the boss must be defended no matter how odious and atrocious.
No time in the history of our country has the call for drug tests among politicians and their aides been more germane than now. The solution to our continual groping in the dark may just reside in drug tests for our power wielders, politicians and their aides. In a country where everything is manipulated, I suggest that foreign bodies should conduct the drug tests among politicians and their aides for the sake of transparency. If this is done, it will shock Nigerians to know the calibre of people making laws for them and presiding over their common destiny.
Why did the government approve compulsory drug tests for civil servants, students, and customs officers while politicians and their aides are spared? The policies that impoverish people and their daily defence must be attributable to impairment, it can never be ordinary. These conditions in our country that seems like a war situation while the political class frolic in obscenity are induced by something. It can never be normal. These inducements that push the political class and their aides to ignore the daily bloodshed in the country has a background. I am convinced that I am right on this – every politician and power holder in the country, their aides and assistants should undergo a mandatory drug test. Let us start from there.
But of course, there are normal, well-behaved politicians in Nigeria. It is not difficult to identify them and we know them. Their utterances, public engagements, history, background and general trajectory can easily be explained and situated among reasonable minds. However, to avoid partiality, every politician in Nigeria, no matter the classification, should under a drug test to save the country from continual misdirection. Any country where drug addicts oversea state resources and decide the destiny of millions of people is a doomed country. God forbid.
