The Chairman of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Brig Gen Buba Marwa (Rtd) on Thursday said that the agency needs to build its barracks to safeguard the lives of it’s officers and men from the threats of drug barons whom he said were assassinating them.
Marwa made this known at a budget defence session with the House of Representatives Committee of Drugs and Narcotics to defend the Agency’s 2022 budget performance and 2023 budget proposal on Thursday.
According to him, in the last 22 months, operatives of the Agency have covered alot of ground in the renewed fight against drug trafficking and abuse in the country.
He added that from January 2021, the Agency has arrested over 19, 000 persons.
Consequently, the former military administrator stressed the need for the urgent provision of barracks for operatives of the Agency as a means of boosting their morale and improving their welfare.
In his words, “The barracks issue is very critical to us because as we all know the NDLEA is very aggressive now against drug traffickers and the drug barons and when you arrest and prosecute them and send them to jail, they are not happy. So they come after our personnel and with our personnel living in the towns and cities and among them, we have been recording casualties and assassinations against them,”
He said N24 billion was allocated to the barracks project in the 2022 budget and that it had been slashed to N13 billion in the 2023 budget proposal.
He, therefore, called for an additional N10 billion to augment what was originally approved for the projects.
“Like I said earlier the President had graciously approved the construction of barracks for the Agency last 2022. The barrack project is ongoing and the sum of N13 billion has been captured in the 2023 budget proposal. Last year it was N24 billion.
“Actually, 24 billion cannot build a barrack, complete barrack. But we had to figure out certain key priorities in selected areas, bearing in mind the need to go around all the geopolitical zones and this year, we have been able to look at four zones. We have touched Lagos but it still needs more to be done.
“We pray that with more money for the barrack, because N13 billion would probably build half a barracks, but if we are able to achieve another 10 billion or more on this barrack, then we would be able to add three more of the geopolitical zones for us to complete six. Hopefully as the years go by and we have other chairman, the struggle for barracks would continue,” he added.
