Naming and Shaming: Is this the Solution to Zimbabwe’s Drug Scourge?

By Staff Reporter

The arrest of 17 drug peddlers in a recent police sweep is a step in the right direction to act on the growing epidemic of drug abuse. Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) must be applauded for initiating the move of taking the suspects in for arrest and taking illicit drugs off the streets. However, the “naming and shaming” approach, like announcing the home addresses of the people arrested, is seriously unethical and can be self-damaging in the long run.

Suspects aged between 22-45 years were arrested across the country, from urban areas such as Harare and Mutare to the rural areas of Banket and Karoi. They are accused of a range of offenses, including the illegal possession of illicit drugs like cannabis (dagga/mbanje), cocaine, and crystal meth, and illegal possession of unregistered medication, like codeine-based cough medicines like BronCleer and other prescription medication. One individual was also arrested for cultivating cannabis.

While the motive for this approach is likely to deter others and demonstrate the authorities’ resolve, it can have a range of unintended consequences. Firstly, open publication of addresses can unwittingly make such premises contact points for drug seekers. Rather than displacing drug syndicates, it can unwittingly give rise to new ones. Secondly, the people themselves are assumed to be innocent until they are found guilty, but the open shame has serious social stigma, which can lead to long-term damage for them and their families whether they will or not be found innocent. Is the practice fairly just and equitable?

In addition to this, the numbers discovered on every individual by the police provide an unmistakable feeling of the rocketing statistics of drug and substance abuse in Zimbabwe. Although accurate statistics are hard to come by, anecdotal reports and evidence indicate a shocking rise in drug abuse, especially among vulnerable youth. 32% of the population of Zimbabwe were between the ages of 10 and 24 years, a highly vulnerable age group to drug abuse, as reported in a 2023 UNICEF report. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) also reported the increase of drug-related use globally, which has hit millions of individuals globally.

So, in this light, just policing and arresting might be overlooking the reasons for drug abuse, and those are complex. There are issues related to poverty, lack of employment, education lack, social pressures, and trauma that need to be addressed as we. Arresting people without dealing with these root causes is treating the symptom and not the illness. It’s a short-term solution that fails to deal with the systemic causes fueling the drug trade.

The role of the ZRP, much as it is required, should be supplemented with a more sweeping and multi-level effort. We must make prevention and treatment schemes more money. We must inform adolescents of the dangers of drug dependence and provide cheaper and accessible treatment centers. We must seek out the underlying social and economic conditions that are risk factors in our addiction. We should create a culture of compassion and support, rather than judgmental and stigmatizing, to enable the drug dependents to overcome their addictions.

Combating drug and substance abuse must be done with an integrated strategy. Experts emphasize that intervention should be at the individual, family, community, organizational, and government levels. The methods suggested in the intervention include but are not limited to, intensive education and awareness campaigns, life skills training, readily available mental health counseling, family therapy, community programs, workplace programs, and effective law enforcement. Moreso, facilitating coordination among stakeholders, enhancing healthy alternative activities, encouraging economic empowerment, and changing cultural attitudes that glamorize drug use are also crucial elements.

The most commonly abused drugs and substances in Zimbabwe are skunk, tofi tofi, musogodo, crystal meth, cannabis, alcohol, tobacco, codeine cough syrups, and heroin. Fortunately, the government saw how worse things have become, through the Ministry of Health and Child Care, the Zimbabwean government saw that drug and substance abuse is closely associated with unsafe sex and other physical and mental diseases.

It is comforting to know that the government is employing a multi faceted solution in combating the drug epidemic, as seen in the National Drug Master Plan and the National Committee on Drug and Substance Abuse, and is very much welcomed. However, the issue of funding is a problem in achieving a zero usage of drugs. For these programmes to succeed they need to be funded sufficiently and carried out properly. They need to take precedence over evidence-based practices that have been proven to work elsewhere and not employ techniques that will produce unintended adverse effects.

Even with these efforts, there are very serious problems. Few resources, the entrenched stigma of addiction, and little information about drug use limit progress. Agencies such as the Zimbabwe Association for Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation of the Offender (ZACRO) and the Zimbabwe Civil Liberties and Drug Network (ZCLDN) are attempting to deliver rehabilitation services and to push for evidence-based policy changes.

The Chegutu arrests last week, where 22 young people were discovered at a party fueled by drugs, are a testament to the seriousness of the problem. Zimbabwe’s future is in the hands of her young people, and we cannot afford to lose them to the destruction of drug abuse. We must discuss this problem at a national level, one that transcends simplistic “naming and shaming” and seeks to discover long-term solutions. We require a unified strategy that combines law enforcement and public health efforts, social services, and an open commitment to eradicating the underlying causes of addiction. Only then can we hope to stem this horrific plague.

The ZRP also urged citizens to continue providing tips on drug dealers and vendors at their National Complaints Desk (0242) 703631) or WhatsApp line (0712 800 197). These latest arrests represented a case in point of revived resolve in having a serious handle on the drugs problem. Real triumph, nonetheless, would ride on the effort over time that would be in concert in every area of the Zimbabwean life.