A SUCCESS OR A DEBACLE? THE NATIONAL DRUG LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCY’S FIGHT AGAINST ILLEGAL DRUGS IN NIGERIA, 1989-2021

Abstract

Nigeria, as at today, is seriously beleaguered by drug problem. Drug abuse in Nigeria has increased to an alarming rate in recent times and there are as many types of drugs as there are the people who abuse them. No part of Nigeria is left out of the problem, just as new and trendy intoxicating substances keep evolving almost on daily basis and finding their way into every nook and cranny of society with little or no check. More worrisome but engaging is the fact that this trend is accompanied by some drug problems which have thrown Nigeria into perpetual anarchy in the form of kidnapping for ransom, cultism, armed robbery, militancy, banditry, domestic violence, prostitution, among others. Obviously, situation as this calls for a re-appraisal of the effort of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) as the only critical agency established by law to eradicate drug abuse in Nigeria. With a focus on the history, reasons, activities, and challenges of the NDLEA, this study seeks to place the agency in proper perspective-to present to the reader the circumstances that inspired the formation as well as how far it has fared in its mandate within the period under review. Tainted with certain levels of success, this study equally while specifying some notable positive moves on the part of the NDLEA, has not failed to recognize the litany of challenges emergent in this type of task, moreso when most of these items have a long history of cultural permissibility. Appraising the NDLEA within the specified scope has successfully exposed Nigeria’s ubiquitous endemic issues which fuel and propel drug abuse cutting across the divide. The paper, thus, posits that the inability of the NDLEA to eradicate drug abuse completely does not in any way suggest it is a failed Agency. This paper is historical; hence, it adopts a qualitative method of analysis. Useful pieces of information were sourced from the Internet, extant and relevant secondary documents, and media reports on drug abuse.