Jakarta, Feb 28, 2006
(ANTARA News) - Eddy, a security guard, still mourns the death of his
only son. His son was only 23 year-old when he died two years ago due to
a narcotic overdoze.
He could not believe that
his son, a good boy from a modest family, was a drug addict given the
fact that the family was not rich and certainly could not afford "the
luxury" of consuming narcotics or other illicit drugs.
Thousands of young men have wasted their lives because of illicit drugs in Indonesia.
They were mostly victims of a "cruel" environment, a broken home,
poverty, ignorance, curiosity, or particularly of the illegal drug
mafia.
Young men from poor families are among the main
targets of illicit drug traffickers to be recruited as couriers. At the
beginning, the traffickers give them narcotics or other drugs free of
charge. And when finally they got addicted, they are willing to do
anything such as stealing their parents money or working as illicit
drug couriers.
According to data of the National
Narcotic Body (BNN), around 3.2 million Indonesian people are illicit
drug users. Some 15,000 people die every year due to consumption of
narcotics and other illicit drugs.
Around 71 percent
of the users consumed hashish, heroin/low-grade heroin (62 percent),
shabu-shabu (crystal methamphetamine) (57 percent), ecstasy (34 percent)
and sedative drugs (25 percent). In the capital city with its
population of of around 10-million it is estimated that three out of 10
young people are drug users.
A study conducted by the
International Labor Organization (ILO) office in Indonesia last year
showed that two out of 10 users are involved in illicit drug or
"narkoba" trafficking.
Some teenagers even started
using and trafficking "narkoba" at the age of 13, Dede Shinta Sudono,
National Program Officer of the International Program on the Elimination
of Child Labor (IPEC) ILO Jakarta said in June 2005.
"Narkoba"
is the Indonesian term for narcotics, psychotropic and addictive
substances. Psychotropic substances popularly called Ecstasy and
Shabu-shabu (crystal methamphetamine) are preferred by the middle and
upper-class users.
However, for an increasing number
of young people, the drug of choice is low-grade heroin, known as putaw,
which is cheap, plentiful but potentially deadly.
These
drugs are readily available in all major urban areas, including
schools, karaoke lounges, bars, cafes, discotheques, nightclubs, and
they even foun their way into remote villages. Therefore, it is not
surprising that drug users continue to increase from year to year.
According
to BNN, the government`s policy against the drug problem is
comprehensive and multidimensional, covering the aspects of prevention,
eradication of drug abuse and drug-related crime. Schools are among the
top targets the anti-narkoba campaigns.
Reports on increasing drug abuse indicate that Indonesia has shifted from previously being a transit area into a consumption and marketing area.
According to the 1999 Narcotics Report on the Asia-Pacific Region, Indonesia is becoming increasingly vulnerable to sophisticated trafficking groups.
Heroin is believed to be smuggled into Indonesia from the "Golden Triangle" countries (Thailand, Burma, and Laos). Drugs entering Indonesia frequently transit Thailand, either from Bangkok to Jakarta or from Bangkok to Singapore to Jakarta.
The Indonesian Police also report an increase in heroin and opium derivatives being smuggled into Jakarta and Bali from the "Golden Crescent" countries (Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran).
Drug abuse has also contributed to the increase of HIV/AIDS patients in Indonesia, through the usage of not sterile injections.
New
populations, especially young people, are becoming involved with
illicit drugs and with their injection. According to BNN, there were
around 575,000 drug injectors in Indonesia, and some 200,000 to 300,000 of them tested positive for HIV.
Drug use has become one of the major causes of the HIV epidemic in the Asia region. The threat of HIV/AIDS in Indonesia
was worrying because it multiplies very fast due to the use of
contaminated injections by drug users. Needle sharing will soon surpass
unsafe sex as the most common method of contracting HIV.
According
to the Indonesian law, illicit drug users could be put in jail. In the
past years, most of the captures and finally went to jail were users,
while arrests of big syndicates were rarely heard. Police and other law
enforces were often criticized for failure in apprehending serious drug
trafficking criminals.
Law enforcement in Indonesia is considered very weak due to bribery and corruption, which are quite common among security and legal officers.
"Every
day there are reports of arrests of drug users, but those arrests are
not significant. The government must arrest and punish big traffickers
to death. The youths are merely victims," said Chairman of the National
Movement of Anti-Narcotics and Other Illicit Drugs (Granat), Henry
Yosodiningrat few years ago.
According to Granat,
around 90 per cent of the total addicts are poor. It is the duty of the
government to save the young people, the assets and the future of the
nation. The addicted youths are victims and they have the right to
receive medical services from the government.
"This is an extremely serious issue for us. It`s a threat that could kill an entire generation," Henry once said
However,
in line with the national reforms, the situation has changed into
better since the past couple years with the success of the Indonesian
police in uncovering shabu-shabu factories and arresting members of
transnational drug syndicates.
Early this year,
Jakarta Police arrested a Chinese citizen believed to be a member of a
Hong Kong-based drug syndicate that smuggled 200 kilograms of
shabu-shabu (crystal methamphetamine) into Jakarta.
"The syndicate put the drugs inside Chinese ceramics imported from Hong Kong.
By doing this, they managed to get past the port`s officials," Chief of
the narcotics unit at the Jakarta Police, Sr. Com. Carlo Brix Tewu
said.
Police began uncovering the syndicate`s
operations in Indonesia after they arrested one of its members,
identified as Leam Marita, alias Aling, on Jan. 27 along with 57,000
ecstasy pills in Artha Gading Apartment in North Jakarta.
The
seizure is believed to be the second biggest in the country after
police managed to raid an ecstasy factory in Cikande, Banten province,
last year.
On 17 April 2005, the Indonesian police arrested nine Australians, now known as "the Bali Nine" at the Ngurah Rai Airport, on Bali Island, for attempting to smuggle 8.2 kg of heroin from Bali to Australia.
The
Denpasar District Court sentenced two Australian citizens to death for
being convicted as the ringleaders of a heroin smuggling gang, and life
imprisonment for seven other members of the gang.
The
then BNN chief, Commissioner General Sutanto, who is currently the
Indonesian Police Chief, said in his last year's report that there was a
sharp increase in the arrests of drug criminals during 2005.
Sutanto
said that during 2005, the police had uncovered 12,256 drug cases,
arrested 16,702 people, including 70 foreigners, and saized among other
things around 20,904 kg of hemp plants, 93,156 kg of shabu-shabu, and
233,467 pills of ecstasy.
On April 8, 2005, the
Police found an ecstasy factory having a production capacity of 504,00
pills daily in Bogor (West Java) ; on November 11, 2005, an ecstasy and
shabu-shabu factory with capacity of producing 100 kg per week in
Cemplang Cekande (Banten); on November 23, 2005, esctasy factories with
production capacity of 8,000 pills per hour in Banyuwangi and Malang
(East Java) on November 23, 2005, which were owned by Indonesian,
Singapore, Hong Kong and Malaysian citizens.
The
Indonesina police, and the people in general, should rejoice and be
proud of last year's discovery of shabu-shabu and ecstasy factories
which ranked as the world's third biggest.
The big busts are hopefully a sign of the beginning of the prevalence of clean governance in Indonesia and a sign of the government s strong commitment to save the country's younger generation. (*)
Tuesday, 28 February 2006
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