Frontline Security Beat Association Hits Hard At Drug Abuse, Cultism, and Domestic Violence
••• Holds NAOSNP Awareness Walk alongside POLICE, NDLEA, FRSC, DSVA, and CSOs
By People’s Voice Nigeria | News
A frontline team of media men covering the security beat, the National Association of Online Security News Publishers (NAOSNP), stormed the streets of Lagos on Tuesday, June 20th, in an awareness walk against drug abuse, cultism, domestic violence, and other social vices. Targeted at sensitizing the public against vices which are highly connected with crimes and criminality in society, NAOSNP organized the walk – the first of its kind – with the collaboration of lead security agencies such as the Nigeria Police and the National Association of Online Security News Publishers.
The Awareness walk, which took off from the Commissioner of Police, CP Idowu Owohunwa’s office in GRA, Ikeja, cut through major highways of the metropolis, including Medical Road, Obafemi Awolowo Way, Allen/Adeniyi Jones Junction, Alausa Secretariat, and Governors Avenue, among others. It terminated at the Lagos State House of Assembly complex in Alausa, Ikeja, where the media contingent was received by officials of the Rt. Hon. Mudashiru Obasa-led Legislative Assembly. There, the President of NAOSNP, Oki Samson, charged the state lawmakers to continue to churn out laws that will place a strong deterrent to the menace of drug abuse, cultism, and domestic violence in Nigeria’s commercial nerve centre, Lagos. Oki emphasized that these social vices are predominant among youths and pleaded with them to focus on productive ventures.
Flagging off the Walk, the Lagos Commissioner of Police, CP Idowu Owohunwa, who was represented by the Deputy Commissioner of Police in Charge of Administration, DCP Bassey Ewah, noted that the Nigeria Police Force, with special emphasis on the Lagos State Command, is committed to rooting out crime from the state and will not hesitate to welcome any stakeholder who is committed to the same cause.
Consequently, the CP lauded the efforts of NAOSNP in putting together the sensitization walk, stressing that the effort is a new strategy to launch the attack against the menace in society. ‘With what you are doing, people will get wiser and make the right choices. You can imagine what a drunken driver can do under the influence of alcohol. With what you are doing, we are half way there. We are solidly at your back’, NAOSNP can report.
Ewah continued: ‘This Command is ready to partner with you as far as fighting these societal problems are concerned, and we would do that to bring this menace to its barest minimum.’
Lending his voice, the Commander of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Lagos State Command, Usman Ishaq Adoro, who was represented by the Deputy Commander, Kareem Makinde, and DCN Titilayo Ogunluyi, noted ‘banditry, cultism, and terrorism are traceable to drug use because something is pushing them to misbehave. With your collaboration and what we are having with the Army and Police, we are going to fight this war together to the highest level and conquer.’
Other agencies represented at the Walk were the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), the Domestic and Sexual Violence Agency (DSVA), the Centre for the Defence of Human Rights, and ECAPI, among many others.
The President of the Association, Mr. Samson Oki, who spoke earlier, noted that the walk is borne out of genuine concern for the future of the youths of the country. ‘We are concerned about the future of our youth.” We felt that we could not continuously be on the sidelines reporting without contributing our quota to the war against drug abuse, cultism, and domestic violence. We need to tackle this menace that has enten deep into some youths’.
