A faith-based Non-for-Profit organisation, Anchor International, has frowned against the menace of substance abuse and sex-for-grades in higher institutions.
The President of Anchor International Youth and Teens Work Academy (AIYTA), Dr. Bolarinwa Omotosho, stated this during the Cohort 1 and Cohort 4 residency of AIYTA in Lagos.
He said: “Our nation is sitting on a keg of gun powder today because this menace has entrenched itself in communities. Therefore, parents, government, and religious institutions need to be blamed because all these social behaviors started at home and were influenced by peers and the media.”
He lamented most students, teenagers, and youths have recorded mental illness and poor academic performance owing to substance abuse.
This, he said, necessitated the forum that attracted Professor Babatunde, Provost of the Redeemed Christian Bible College Professor Babatunde; Senior Lecturer at Lagos State University Dr Ranti Samuel; a member of the Board of Trustees, Dr. Priscilla Omotosho and Barrister Rotimi Ogunwuyi, a legal practitioner.
Youths, he said, have embraced tobacco, alcohol, cannabis, cocaine and all manners of pharmaceutical drugs.
According to him, many of them attribute the abuse to family neglect, academic stress, societal influence, peer pressure, parental misuse of drugs, traumatic life events and social-economic factors.
Omotosho said all relevant stakeholders, including parents, religious organisations and societies must take a stance against substance abuse.