DEC MUST RID COUNTRY OF ILLEGAL DRUGS

The importance of the efforts of the Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC)
to rid our society of illicit drugs cannot be over-emphasised.

The zeal with which the commission has gone about carrying out its
duties right across the land is highly commendable.

But the commission might be missing something in its pursuit of the
rural growers of the cannabis. The drug barons are here in the urban
areas.

These are the people who encourage the poor villagers to cultivate
these dangerous crops in large quantities which they buy at very low
prices, export and amass massive profits.

To them, every sale must rake in good profits. These are the people
who walk around scot-free and yet they are building mansions, driving
expensive cars and generally living well.

These are the people that our DEC should target, those lavishly living
it up but whose source of income is shrouded in mystery.

These big-time dealers have the money and the connections, at home and
abroad, to always keep a step of ahead of the law.

These are the people that the DEC should move against without fear or
favour.

Our villagers do not have contacts to sell cannabis for the big money
that it fetches beyond our borders and few of them hold passports but
they are used by those at the top of the chain and paid peanuts for
the huge risk they take.

And because of the high poverty levels in our rural areas, the poor
villagers are left with no option but to risk their lives by
cultivating the wrong crop.

It would be appropriate for DEC to first start a vigorous educational
campaign to educate the poor villagers about the dangers to themselves
and their communities of growing cannabis.

This exercise should be conducted in conjunction with the ministry of
Agriculture whose officials should explain the benefits of growing
more acceptable cash crops.

Most (if not all) villagers have been growing cannabis in their
backyards from time immemorial, long before DEC came into being and
told them the crop was harmful to them.

So the best approach is to assist these people understand that even
casual smoking of dagga is dangerous and against the laws of Zambia.

They should be made to understand why cannabis is not quite as
harmless as they think, even if they have been growing and smoking it
for decades.

Chief Chembe and his cannabis-cultivating subjects in Mkushi who fled
their village when DEC officers visited them would appear to be more
in need of education than a stint in the coolers.