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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Trapped in the Traffick: Growing Problems of Drug Consumption in Lagos
Author:Klein, AxelISNI
Year:1994
Periodical:Journal of Modern African Studies
Volume:32
Issue:4
Pages:657-677
Language:English
Geographic term:Nigeria
Subjects:drug trafficking
drug use
drugs
Health and Nutrition
Law, Human Rights and Violence
Urbanization and Migration
External link:https://www.jstor.org/stable/161568
Abstract:This article deals with the growing problems of drug consumption in Lagos, Nigeria, on the basis of the author's field observations from the drug 'scene' in both high and low density areas in the city in 1990. Until recently, conventional wisdom had it that Nigeria merely served as a transit point for heroin and cocaine. This tendency to concentrate on drug trafficking was reflected in the countermeasures designed by successive governments. However, while most cocaine/heroin arriving in Nigeria is smuggled onwards to the lucrative markets of Western Europe, the United States, and elsewhere, a considerable amount is consumed by a rapidly growing number of local drug users. There is evidence that the habit of taking hard drugs was first acquired by Nigerians during periods of study or vacations abroad. Drugs are used as an initiation into a subculture, for escapism, as conspicuous consumption; but they also feed into existing cultural patterns of hedonism, and are associated with darker powers. The real issue today is no longer the relatively trifling impact that a number of Nigerian carriers have on consumption elsewhere in the world, but the spreading drug habits among the urban population of a crisis-ridden African country. Notes, ref.
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