By Emmanuel Nduka
Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Brig. Gen. Buba Marwa (retd), has proposed compulsory drug test for intending couples before marriage.
The NDLEA Chief who made the proposal at the public presentation of “Legacies of a Legend”, a book on Ambassador Bamanga Tukur, advised parents to insist on drugs test before giving out their daughters in marriage.
“I must take advantage of this audience. Please, how many of you will like your daughters to marry drug addicts? Raise your hands.
“Before wedding, we always do HIV test; we do genotype test. I appeal to you, please, let also have a drug test before wedding,” he advised.
Speaking on a different note, President Muhammadu Buhari who was represented by his Chief of Staff, Ibrahim Gambari, said debts incurred by African countries prior to the cancellation for 32 countries in 2005 were not channelled into appropriate economic goods and services that could bring the much needed growth.
He said if properly contracted and utilised effectively, debts is an important instrument in the economic blueprint of a government in its policy making scope.
“During the latter part of my engagement there (UN), I recalled Bamanga Tukur’s activities with Tony Blair led Commission for Africa in 2004/2005 and how that led to the 2005 G8 Summit landmark decision on debt cancellation for 32 African countries.
“Prior to that, many poor African countries were using large portion of their little resources to service debt obligations.
“The benefits of debt cancellation was that many African countries were then able to free up resources which they previously channelled into debt servicing and deployed them into socio-economic and infrastructural projects.
“That explained the fact that shortly after, the fastest growing economy was from Africa which perfectly fuelled Africa’s rising narrative. To my mind, much credits are not yet given to the role played by Alhaji Bamanga Tukur in the process. We must recognize that now,” he added.
