GLUE SNIFFING GOES ON DESPITE ORDER

NAIROBI -The Attorney-General criminalised the inhaling of glue in the
country last August. His act came after a long time of waiting and it
sounded a splendid thing to do at the time.

But it is as if he did nothing: Sniffing of glue as any one will tell
him continues with the same usualness it used to even before the good
A-G thought it wise to criminalise its sale.

Criminal Law (amendment) Act 2003, No 46, says that any person found
distributing substances declared by the Minister for Health as harmful
to children will be liable to imprisonment for three years.

This notwithstanding, every street kid in Nairobi walks with a bottle
of glue on his mouth. And they do not care whether it is legal or not
to do this. After all, no one asks them. They could even be ignorant
of the law, matters of hand-to-mouth living taking precedence over
everything else.

Where do they get the glue? Of course, from the same sources they have
always been getting it from. The sellers are still very much in
business, regardless of the law. They sell the glue to the kids and
get a quick buck. Of course the law turns the other way.

Having the AG enact a law against glue-sniffing was one tiny victory
in the war against drugs and substance abuse. The challenge, as can
now be seen, is to enforce the law.

But who is supposed to do this? Not the National Agency for the
Campaign Against Drug Abuse which has no powers to arrest. Not the
AG's office whose role is only to prosecute. Not the Children's
Welfare Department. This is the turf of the police, the provincial
administration and the public health officers .

They have all failed. And by so doing have condemned these ignorant
children to a short, thoroughly contaminated life. That the children
are there in the streets today is already an indictment on the
society. Must we turn the knife by letting them destroy their
not-so-dainty lives in this fashion? Where is the provincial
administration? Where are public health officers? Where are the police?