United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) on Tuesday sensitized children among others on drug abuse and organized crimes in Nigeria.
The UNODC sensitise campaign was organized to commemorate the World Drug Day held in Lagos.
Themed “Vision of the Child” is aimed at listening to children and youth which is the first step to help them grow healthy and safe.
Speaking at the event, William Wu Shiyin, UNODC’s Project Officer said the organization is created to assist Member States and others to roll back threats caused by drugs, transnational organized crime in their countries.
“Our objective is to support the Nigerian government in its efforts to fight illicit drug production, trafficking and use, and use and to curb related organized crime, including counterfeit narcotics and psychotropic substances,” he said.
“In its aim to curb risk factor associated with the girl child, UNODC will be launching “Techy girls initiative” in July, 2018. The initiative is a platform for educating the girl children and making them innovative, creative, change makers and productive through technology”.
Thus, the initiative adopted 17 change makers who were all children from various schools present at the event as the pioneers.
One of the beneficiaries of this initiative, Toluwani Fayose, from CIS Lagos showed her excitement over the appointment.
“Am honoured and excited to be part of this and it is my belief that through technology, Nigeria will impact the global world positively.
Fayose who also showed her paintings, depicting the situation of drug abusers in Nigeria said: “In my work, I was trying to show that people who take drugs are not bad and should be listened to. My message is that people should care more for drug abusers and always be ready to listen to them”
In another interview with one Miss Mmesoma Okonkwo, Lead Forte College, Lekki, she said innovation and less use of drugs will create a sustainable economy which in turn will lead to more job employment for the youth.
UNODC also launched the Movie – Trapped in response to Global Campaign Against Drug during the event. The movie is a short story directed by the veteran actor, Eddie Watson.