Lawal Muduru also known as Malam Niga, who owns Niga’s Rehabilitation Centre, has accused governors of northern states of being unconcerned about the youths in the region.
Muduru said this while speaking with journalists in Kaduna, adding that northern governors do not take the issue of drug abuse among the youth seriously, and that is why the problem has remained.
Muduru, he also dismissed reports that the center was a house of torture, shortly after he was released on bail — he added that prominent people in society bring their children to the centre to be rehabilitated.
As for chaining inmates, he said it was done to prevent them from going violent owing to their issues with drug abuse and mental illness.
He claimed also that it would be wrong for the state government to feign ignorance of the centre because the “ministry of youths and sport and other government agencies sent mentally unstable people to the centre for rehabilitation”.
“Still, last Saturday, the governor came in a convoy of security men to my centre interrogating me why I was chaining children and I explained to him that all I do is teach the inmates trade,” he said.
“I showed them everything. I explained that some inmates do run away from the centre and never return home to meet their relatives and if they run away from the centre, the parents confront me.
“I also explained that in most cases, the inmates usually run into trouble once they are not within the rehabilitation centre’s premises. Some may even lose their lives and the relatives take me to court if I can’t provide their children.
“We all know that drug abuse is prevalent in the north, and in Kano and Jigawa states alone, people consume many bottles of codeine daily.
“What I observed is that in all the 19 northern states in the country, none of the governors takes the issue of drug abuse seriously. The future of the youth is of less concern to them and that has been the reason we have so many restive youths and crises in the north.”