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Drug
abuse in Sri Lanka shows clear signs of worsening
Banyan
News Reporters learns that officials investigating wacky
behaviour in a large number of Sri Lankans since May
this year have uncovered disturbing evidence, indicating
that a significant majority of the population have been
acting under the influence of illicit drugs for many
years.
BNR
spoke to Upul Amarakoon, a community intervention
officer working for the Alcohol and Drug Information
Centre (ADIC) who had extensive experience in dealing
with drug users. “To be honest, I thought I noticed
peculiar behavioural patterns in the community for a
while now!” he says. “I can’t exactly say for sure when
I started, but what actually made me notice that
something was wrong is the behaviour of foreigners who
visited Sri Lanka.”
For
many years, officials from International Humanitarian
Organisations have shown distinct symptoms of drug use
after visiting Sri Lanka that they had not shown during
or after their visits to other conflict areas in the
world such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Amarakoon points
out that “Change in overall attitude and personality,
excessive talkativeness, paranoia and tantrums, chronic
dishonesty, difficulty in paying attention and
forgetfulness are all classic symptoms of substance
abuse.”
Peculiar behaviour
The
spread and intensity of peculiar behaviour was even more
apparent among Sri Lankans and have caught the attention
of the whole world in recent years. The lame public
sector and politicians such as Mervyn Silva have for
decades stood out as alarm calls about a deep-rooted
social issue. However, the well known Sri Lankan
terrorist group led by Velupillai Prabhakaran were
notorious for their drug smuggling operations throughout
and South and Southeast Asia and many saw them as the
root cause of the problem and all efforts to stem the
substance abuse crisis in the country were focused on
eradicating terrorism.
“Like
many others, I expected the problem to ease once the
LTTE has been eradicated” admits Amarakoon who was
disturbed by the fact that the symptoms became even more
acute after the war. Towards the latter stages of the
war, Amarakoon recalls stumbling on a group of people
who were trying to get a fix by smoking an effigy of
David Milliband in front of the British high commission.
“I thought it was a sign that with the demise of the
LTTE, they were running out of other forms of narcotics,
but later events have shown than this was not the case.”
Amarakoon points out that he recognised that the problem
had penetrated deep into the social fabric of the
country when the health minister blamed the dengue
epidemic on mini skirts and the army commander wanted to
recruit another one hundred thousand soldiers after the
war had ended!
Out of control
But
experts realised the problem was really gotten out of
control when the Buddhist monks started calling the
President various names. “I mean, I have worked for many
years with drug addicts and I know how doped you must
get to come up with a names like ‘Vishva Keerthi Sri
Thri Sinhaladheeshwara’ and ‘Sri Lanka Rajawansa
Vibooshana Dharmadeepa Chakravarthi,’ Amarakoon
whispered.
The
unfolding events found investigators helplessly looking
for explanations when a chance discovery by customs
officials unravelled smugglers using potatoes as their
medium. Samples tested on suspicion from lunch packets
of government officials, food offerings at temples, and
buffets at army headquarters contained devilled
potatoes, potato curry, mashed potatoes and potato balls
contained heavy doses of illicit, brain-numbing and
fattening chemicals.
Amarakoon however is not satisfied with the immediate
conclusions of these tests and urges the public to be
careful about the kinds of food and thoughts they
consume. “If you take the history of Sri Lanka”, he
points out, “there is evidence that potatoes were not
always the preferred way of doping people.”
It’s
true. Sri Lankans have been doped before by bread (at Rs
3.50) and free rice.
—
Courtesy Groundviews |
