…Says, ‘90% of private rehab centres are torture, rape camps’
From: Fred Ezeh, Abuja
A non-governmental organisation, YouthRISE Nigeria, has raised the alarm over the poor condition of rehabilitation centers for people who affected by excess drugs use or other ill-mental status.
The group is deeply concerned and alleged that over 90 percent of private rehabilitation centres in Nigeria have subjected young people in their care to physical and emotional torture, rape, abuses as well as other dehumanising conditions.
The group also said that the deteriorated condition of the rehabilitation centers was as a result of poor monitoring mechanisms by relevant government agencies responsible for that.
Project Coordinator of the group, Adeolu Ogunrombi, told journalists at a press conference, in Abuja, that research conducted by the group revealed that there are many rahabilitation centers with lot of human right abuses going on in closed setting.
The research, according to him, was undertaken as part of celebration of the 2017 Human Rights Day, with focus on young people within closed settings, to get their experiences and impact of the rehabilitation centers to their recovery.
He said: “We discovered in the course of our interaction that it was about torture, poor quality healthcare, being kept in prison-like and dehumanizing condition, with some having chains around their legs. All these are done in an attempt to make them drug-free. Unfortunately, the society is not aware of the operations of these centers and they are rarely monitored.”
Ogunrombi thus appealed to the Federal Government through the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), and other regulatory bodies to closely monitor the centres to ensure they reserve minimum human respect to people kept in their custody.
He observed that non-monitoring of the centres by government was mainly due to the fact that people who use drugs are believed to have no human right and by locking them up they can be drug free.
“It also a fallout of ineffective drug policy that see drug users as criminals rather than individuals in need of support and public health services,” he said.
He suggested that Nigerian government set up what he called minimum human rights standard and enforce same for everyone operating drug rehabilitation and treatment centers across the country.
“It is also imperative to review our drug laws so that those with problematic drug use are not treated as criminals but provided access to effective treatment and rehabilitation where their human rights are upheld,” he said.