‘Drugs fight needs national buy-in’

Blessings Chidakwa

Herald Reporter

The fight against drug and substance abuse requires the input of everyone starting at family level as represented by communities, scaling up to district, provincial and national levels, the national committee on drug and substance abuse said yesterday.

Under Operation Clean Up Zimbabwe, drugs and substances worth over $439 million have been recovered.

Speaking yesterday after a high-level delegation meeting in Harare, chairperson of the national committee, Minister of Defence and War Veterans Affairs Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri, said the committee was tasked by President Mnangagwa to address drug challenges bedevilling society.

Minister Muchinguri-Kashiri said this followed a successful programme put together by the President which involved a number of ministries and inter-ministerial committees that undertook to establish the depth of the challenges wrought by drugs.

She said when they presented their report to Cabinet, they made some sweeping recommendations.

“Culminating from those recommendations, it was felt that we need a buy-in of every level starting from families as represented by communities,” she said.

“Also, the district structures, provincial structures will feed to the national committee which I chair.

“This is a mammoth task that we were given which requires a lot of courage, commitment and dedication because it is not a problem just facing Zimbabwe, but the world over. Even those with resources are facing this threat.”

Minister Muchinguri-Kashiri said Zimbabwe was concerned that the generation from ages 14 to 64 was suffering from serious drug and substance abuse.

“It (drug abuse) has the capacity to wipe the whole generation,” she said.

“This will affect the whole 2030 vision that the President has. We need the labour force, we need business people as highlighted that Zimbabwe is open for business, ‘Nyika inovakwa nevene vayo’.

“The President wants to make sure that no one is left behind. Given the seriousness of this problem this national committee has been given a task that we must win and achieve.”

Minister Muchinguri-Kashiri said the meeting held yesterday was full of emotions as sensitive issues were shared with everyone participating to enrich the inter-ministerial                                report.