2023: Why aspirants must undergo drug test before primaries – NDLEA boss

• PRP, NNPP back move

The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has written to the chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Abdullahi Adamu, requesting that officials of the agency be given access to conduct drug integrity test on politicians seeking political office in the country.

The NDLEA chairman, Brig Gen Buba Marwa (Rtd), disclosed this on Wednesday in Abuja while speaking at the first quarter best performing award ceremony of the agency for 56 officers.

Gen Marwa also said that when it was the turns of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and other parties to conduct their primaries, the agency would write their national chairmen and request that operatives of NDLEA be allowed to conduct drug integrity test on their aspirants.

Gen Marwa said, “The drug test is necessary to ensure that politicians vested with important national offices do not use budgetary allocations to go and buy cocaine or methamphetamine instead of providing needed services for the masses.

“For politicians, we have long advocated, and I take the opportunity again to repeat the advocacy, that when they run for public office, it demands a lot of responsibility from the person, and we need to be certain if he is a person that is already a drug addict/user who will spend all the money he is given for public service to consume cocaine and his head will not be in a stable condition to handle the affairs he has been entrusted with.

“For this reason, we have advocated and will continue to advocate that drug test be conducted for politicians; some state governments like Kano are already doing this.”

 PRP, NNPP back move

Two opposition parties, the Peoples Redemption Party, (PRP) and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) have supported the decision.

In his reaction, PRP’s National Publicity Secretary, Malam Ibrahim Adamu, described the idea as a good development.  He, however, said psychiatric test should also be added to the test to ascertain the state of mind of those seeking to lead the country.

On his part, Ambassador Agbo Major, National Publicity Secretary of  the NNPP, said there was nothing wrong with the idea.