Ghana against drugs and crime

Page 9: Daily Graphic, April 21, 2009

Article: Albert K. Salia

MANY, if not all seminars, workshops and conferences organised by the state, ministries, departments and agencies and private sector institutions, have yielded very little practical results.
Nice speeches have often been made and continue to be made at such fora, pledges are also made with the view to finding solutions to certain problems. But what happens after such fora?
It was with such reservation but with the benefit of doubt that I attended the Government of Ghana-United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) organised “Ghana Against Drugs and Crime” conference on March 18, 2009 at the British Council.
I seriously hoped that something concrete would be done as a result of the conference. It must be recalled that the various committees that were set up to investigate various drug challenges yielded no significant results. At least the Georgina Wood Committee, the Kojo Armah Committee, the Ampewuah Committee and the Zwennes Committee would suffice here. It seemed the committees were face-saving and adhoc committees set up to assuage public sentiments or to hoodwink the public into believing that something was being done about the drug menace.
At the fora, both the Vice-President, Mr John Dramani Mahama and the Interior Minister, Mr Cletus Avoka gave pledges to see to the amendment of the Narcotics Control Board Law, PNDC Law 236 of 1990. Those pledges are not new because during the first era of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) under former President Jerry John Rawlings those same promises were made by the government to amend the law but that did not happen. The Kufuor administration followed with similar sweet promises but to date, it has not been done.
But certainly, with the Vice-President, the Interior Minister and all those who matter in law enforcement present at the conference, it is the general expectation that at long last “words lead to action and that action leads to success” as the former UN Secretary-general, Perez de Cuellar said in April 1990.
At least the lecture by Carlos Antonio Perez of the Centre for Research and Anthropology in Mexico City, on the “Mexican Experience”, should encourage President John Evans Atta Mills’ government into action.
Mr Perez had made it clear that Mexico has never been a coca - the plant whose leaves are used to produce the drug cocaine, is a powerful stimulant - producing country but had reached the present state of chaos because officialdom and Mexicans ignored the dangers of the drug menace, describing their country as only a transit country.
But today, even in their state as a transit country, an estimated 6,290 drug-related murders occurred in Mexico last year, six times the standard definition of a civil war. On Tuesday, March 24, 2009, the Mexican government had placed a $2 million ransom on the heads of the drug lords in his country. Should we wait for Ghana to come to that state?
This is why I believe the call by Vice-President John Mahama at the conference on Ghanaians to rally behind the government to fight the drug menace in the country must go beyond the call by the government leading the way to mobilise the entire nation to be part of the solution.
The drug problem, as it is well known, is a problem of the people and the people must be part of the solution. No doubt, the drug menace has not only eaten deep into the moral fibre of the society but also worsened organised crime among the youth. It has damaged the image of Ghana in the international community and continued to paint an ugly picture of the country in the eyes of the comity of nations. No wonder that the Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Antonio Maria Costa lamented recently that “the Gold Coast of Africa, one of humanity’s most beautiful assets is turning into a coke (cocaine) coast”. The embarrassing searches that high profile Ghanaians go through at international airports will tell you the seriousness of the stigma.
But if combating the menace has currently become a national security problem, then it means our strategies and commitment to dealing with the menace has been half-hearted and largely unsuccessful. The threat that the drug menace poses to Ghana’s vital democratic institutions and national security is so serious that finding an antidote to it should, therefore, transcend political parochialism.
That is because the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), has made it clear that drug trafficking and the often consequent spread of drug abuse were serious threats to the regional and national security, political, economic and social development of societies and their institutions.
According to the UNODC, “drug-originated financial flows feed violence and corruption, undermine the rule of law and impede the rooting of a culture of sincere democracy built on transparent governance, and a credible criminal justice system,” it said.
Since Mr K. B. Quantson handed over the leadership of the Narcotics Control Board (NACOB) to Colonel Isaac Akuoko in 2001, there has been four changes at the place. ACP Daniel Odai, Major General Baiden, Mr Ben Botwe and currently, ACP Robert Ayalingo, have all taken turns to run NACOB. No doubt, there has been the need for some leadership changes at the NACOB. That was because some of the appointees did not have the requisite capability of managing the complex and sensitive organisation like the NACOB at a time when the global threats of drugs is so high. But the changes themselves would not yield any positive result unless there is a complete structural overhaul. There should be consistency in the leadership direction. To make matter worse, we have some shadow Executive Secretaries, some of who were appointed by word of mouth while others had appointment letters but they never assumed office. Such frequent changes only send wrong signals to the international community that we do not seriously know what we are about.
Needless to say, the NACOB has its problems some of which are the low morale of the staff, poor salaries and appalling working conditions, the discharge suspects under questionable circumstances as well as the failure of the Attorney-General’s Office to appeal against such rulings. But that cannot and should not account for the inefficiency and incompetence of the way have been allowed to run at the NACOB.
It should be recalled that after the Georgina Committee had submitted its report, a high profile experts consultative forum, both local and international, was held at Elmina in October to 2006 to address issues relating to drug control in Ghana. A wonderful piece of work was drafted for implementation but characteristically, what happened to that beautiful document that the state and its foreign partners put so much effort and resources in?
Indeed, Dr J. B. Asare, a founding member of NACOB and currently a member of the International Narcotics Control Board, was blunt in stating at the recent Drugs Conference that Ghana did not have a drug control policy. This should be a shameful embarrassment. And yet politicians and technocrats have mounted various platforms to proclaim commitment and determination to deal with the drug menace. What was the basis of such bold statements. Were they being sincere or they were just engaged in empty political rhetoric?
For the avoidance of doubt, let me encapsulate some of the recommendations of the Report of the Experts Consultation on Narcotic Drug Control in Ghana at Elmina which was held at the instance of the Ministry of the Interior in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) from October 27 to 31, 2006.
Among others on the legal framework of the NACOB, it was recommended that the status of the Narcotics Control Board be transformed to that of a Commission to enhance its status and improve on its performance, should be made independent and autonomous, have the authority to receive, investigate and prosecute any complaint of alleged drug activity or narcotic drug abuse, collaborate with appropriate bodies dealing with anti corruption and money laundering issues and be given the mandate to taking charge, supervise, control, coordinating all the responsibilities, functions and activities relating to arrest, investigation, of all offences connected with or relating to illicit traffic in narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances and precursors.
The Experts also recommended specific amendments to the existing functions of the Board in the Narcotic Drugs (Control) Board Instrument 1990 (L.I. 1507). For instance, it was the view of the experts that the use of the word Narcotics in the L.I. 1507 excluded psychotropic substances and precursors and there was the need to cure it in the interpretation section. That with reference to section 1 (f) “dangers” be used instead of “evils”. That section 1 (h) of L.I. 1507 be amended to read “to perform such other functions as the President of the Republic may assign to it” Enforcement involves a. Investigations b. Arrests c. Prosecutions Investigations in the context should be given a broad meaning and which must include all processes till the end of the judicial process and thereafter. The Experts recommended that specialised courts be established in Accra and elsewhere as the Commission and the Chief Justice may determine from time to time to speed up trials of narcotics cases.
On demand-reduction, the experts recommended that the NACOB produce Drug Awareness manuals, materials for training trainers, encourage the formation of Anti-Drug Clubs at all levels of education and introduce drug testing as part of pre-licensing requisite for all drivers, random drug residue testing for sensitive areas of public and civil society, random drug policy testing for sports men and women.
The experts did a very good job. But characteristically, the document is lying waste. If so much efforts are put in place to assemble such expertise to design such beautiful documents but it is not used, it undermines our own hypocrisy of the fighting the drug menace.