OPINION
Drug War, the President Is Right After All
By Emmanuel Onwubiko
In his second term and indeed final tenure of office as the civilian President of the World’s largest black nation known as Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, a retired infantry General and a Veteran of two wars (Civil war and war against Maitasine Islamists from Cameroun), made a great choice of who should head the rapidly deteriorating National Drugs law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) with his appointment of the erstwhile military Administrator of Lagos State Major General Buba Marwa (rtd).
The previous holder of that position picked by President Buhari in 2015 almost succeeded in destroying what was left of that anti-hard drugs fighting institution.
NDLEA used to be effective when IGPs Fulani Kwajafa and Ogbonnaya Onovo headed it at different times. But it later became a nest of crooks. The last person to occupy the position, although not a crook but throughout his tenure there was a lack of accountability to Nigerians.Having said that, let me quickly warn that the current Chairman of the NDLEA who has a military background and was loved by the Lagos/Ibadan media for been media savvy needs to know that his position is not a media popularity contest, but his achievements would be assessed based on empirical evidence of successful arrests, prosecution, conviction and the institutionalization of a law-based mechanism that is characterized by transparency and accountability.
So his success or failure will not be benchmarked by how many of these media trials he authorizes his officers to conduct each time a suspect is arrested. Marwa should read section 36 (5) of the 1999 constitution and section 6 of the same Grund Norm.
These Constitutional provisions state as follows: section 36 (5) “Every person who is charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed to be innocent until he is proved guilty; Provided that nothing in this section shall invalidate any law by reason only that the law imposes upon any such person the burden of proving particular facts.
Section (6) The judicial powers vested in accordance with the foregoing provisions of this section – (a) shall extend, notwithstanding anything to the contrary in this constitution, to all inherent powers and sanctions of a court of law (b) shall extend, to all matters between persons, or between government or authority and to any persons in Nigeria, and to all actions and proceedings relating thereto, for the determination of any question as to the civil rights and obligations of that person; (c) shall not except as otherwise provided by this Constitution, extend to any issue or question as to whether any act of omission by any authority or person or as to whether any law or any judicial decision is in conformity with the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy set out in Chapter II of this Constitution; (d) shall not, as from the date when this section comes into force, extend to any action or proceedings relating to any existing law made on or after 15th January, 1966 for determining any issue or question as to the competence of any authority or person to make any such law. Section 6 is basically about the judicial powers of the Federation domiciled in the courts of law and not court of public opinion or gossip Newspapers.
Coming back to the theme of this commentary, I must state that the report in the media crediting the President as stating that drug war is much more complex than war on terror is semantically, logically and existentially accurate. Mr. President has never being this philosophically deep. Perhaps the writer of that speech must have been in a very sober mood.
And so, on June 26th 2021, Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari identified drug trafficking and abuse as more threatening to the stability of the nation than banditry and insurgency that are prevalent in some parts of Nigeria.
The president, declared that drug abuse has become so endemic in the country now that it already stretches across three generations of grandparents, parents and their wards.
This is just as the media reported that the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), has disclosed that within the last five months, no fewer than 2,180 suspected traffickers including five drug barons had been nabbed across the country.
President Buhari, who was represented by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Mr Boss Mustapha, spoke at the launch of the War Against Drug Abuse (WADA), an initiative of the NDLEA to mark the United Nations International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Drug Trafficking themed: “Share Facts on Drugs. Save Lives.”
According to the president, it is a war that is destroying three generations, because there were clips of some grandparents on drugs, parents on drugs, and by extension, their wards and children had also taken to drugs.
“So, this is a war that is targeting three generations in a stretch. So, it is more deadly than even the security challenges that we are having in this country and I believe strongly that every effort must be put in place to ensure that we deal with the issues of substance abuse and trafficking and manufacture so that we can get to the root cause of the mirage of insecurity problems that are confronting this nation and I believe strongly, with every bit of conviction, that if we are able to deal with the issues of drug abuse, substantially, our security challenges will drastically reduce as we walk towards a drug free Nigeria.”
The President also charged the NDLEA to intensify efforts at ridding the vast forests of the Southwest and South-South regions of the country of criminal elements, who had made the places their hideouts, from where they launch criminal onslaughts as well as for farming marijuana.
President Buhari said: “I am directing the NDLEA to develop a robust risk-communication and community engagement strategy that will not only disseminate the four pillars of the plan to responsible entities, but also deal with destroying production sites and laboratories, break the supply chain, discourage drug use and prosecute offenders as well as traffickers, rehabilitate addicts and enforcement of relevant laws.
“I want to particularly draw the attention of the agency to the fact that the use of many of our forests as criminal hideouts is because large swathes of cannabis plantations are hidden deep within those forests, especially, in the Southwest and the South-South.
“You may, therefore, need to drive these criminal elements from such hideouts, because they use it for the growth of these plants and also as a repository for criminal elements to conclude and plan their adventures on our people”.
He, however, called on all families, schools, civil society organisations, professional associations, religious organisations, the academia, community leaders and individuals to work for the common good in order to rid their communities of drug use and trafficking.
“As your President, I will continue to address underlying causes of drug abuse, including poverty reduction, for which my pledge for lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty in the next 10 years and strengthened by the recently developed National Poverty Reduction with Growth Strategy signposts my unwavering commitment.
I am tempted to assist President Buhari to adumbrate further and better evidential proofs to demonstrate how so accurate he is on this his very well written and delivered national speech on the wider implications of hard drugs.
First, it is not in doubt that most Countries around the World often put measures in place to check the proliferation of drugs trafficking due to the fundamental truism that drugs affect mostly the Young Population who are at the stage that is scientifically and economically rated as the years of highest National Economic productively.
The productivity of the Youngest Population of Nigeria, obviously, is the driving force of both the formal and informal sectors of Nigeria’s economy.
It therefore implies that if the greater percentage of young people are hooked on hard drugs or are in the business of assisting older drug barons to traffick hard drugs, then the economic wellbeing of Nigeria will shrink significantly and most of the Youths engaged in the crime of drug trafficking when caught may spend the greater fraction of their lives in detention facilities. Already, many young Nigerians have been executed in many Asian nations whereby drug trafficking is a capital offence.
Also, it is globally and statistically proven that most takers and consumers of hard drugs are young people.
These drug habits lead to diverse ramifications, sociologically, psychologically and other wise.
Two cases locally demonstrate the above.
Assuming without accepting hook, line and sinker, the illegal public parade of the 21 year old student of University of Lagos Chidinma Ojukwu about the alleged murder of the middle age media entrepreneur Mr. Usifo Asaga in Lagos, what is a lesson from those shenanigans is the aspect of hard drugs and the science surrounding the altering of the mind of youngsters to commit unimaginable crime that if they are in their conscious mind without hard drugs, they may ordinarily never commit such alleged heinous crime.
Let us take the case of a very popular drug amongst Youths of Nigeria known as tramadol.
Scientists have these warnings for us:
Addiction and misuse: This drug can lead to addiction and misuse, which can result in overdose and death. To help avoid these problems, take this drug exactly as prescribed by your doctor. If you have any concerns about this warning, talk with your doctor.
Slowed or stopped breathing: This drug can slow or stop your breathing. If this isn’t treated immediately, it can cause death. This risk is highest within three days of starting the drug or increasing your dosage.
Accidental ingestion: If anyone, especially children, takes a dose of this drug by accident even once, it can cause death. This drug should be stored out of reach of children.
Life-threatening effects for children: In some cases, children’s bodies can process this drug too quickly. This can lead to slowed breathing and death. This drug shouldn’t be used in children younger than 12 years of age. It should also not be used in children younger than 18 years of age who have certain risk factors, or who have just had a tonsillectomy or adenoidectomy.
Neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome: If you use this medication for a long time while you’re pregnant, it can cause withdrawal in your baby. Withdrawal in your baby can lead to death. Symptoms of withdrawal can include irritability, hyperactivity, unusual sleep patterns, and a high-pitched cry. They can also include tremor, vomiting, diarrhea, and failure to gain weight.
Interactions with certain drugs: Taking tramadol with certain drugs can cause varied serious effects. These effects include increased tramadol levels, possibly leading to seizures and serotonin syndrome. They also include reduced effectiveness of tramadol, and opioid withdrawal symptoms. The drugs that can cause these effects include amiodarone, quinidine, erythromycin, ketoconazole, ritonavir, and similar medications.
Interactions with benzodiazepines: Taking tramadol with benzodiazepines and other similar drugs can cause very serious effects. These effects can include severe fatigue, slowed breathing, coma, and death. (healthline.com).
Just read the report carried in today’s The Guardian newspaper of Nigeria of a young student who jumped to his death after taking some identified hard drug.
The Guardian, the flagship of African media space, reports that a 400-level optometry student of Abia State University, Uturu, has been confirmed dead after jumping down from a three-storey building.
He was reported to be on drugs when he jumped from his lodge called Favour Lodge located off the campus on Saturday evening.
Reports by students revealed that the deceased, identified as Francis Chibuike, in the video recorded after he took a hard drug known as Colorado, was unable to contain its effect.
According to some students, his friends reportedly locked him in the room and went in search of cassava flakes known as garri to restore him back to consciousness, but the deceased went through the balcony and jumped down from the building with blood gushing out from his head before they returned.
A student from the school, Paul Udo, in his Facebook post, said the deceased jumped from the stairs with head shattered beyond medical help.
Another student, Nnadi Thyword, while commenting on the incident, said: “Come to think of it; he is a medical student and ought not to be told the dangers of these drugs. It is doubtful to say that those who take these drugs don’t know the negative effects. This is simply an addiction.”
In the video made available to The Guardian yesterday, the student recording the video, who appeared to own the apartment, where Francis had taken the substance, was heard saying: “I told you not to take it, but you did. I told you I don’t like it. ”
According to a news publication, the Chief Security Officer (CSO) of the institution, Navy Commander ThankGod Evulobi (retired), confirmed the incident, describing it as one of the consequences of hard drugs.
According to him, the deceased, who is from Imo State, drugged himself and told his friends that he was going out only for him to jump out from the window.
Aside this aforementioned story, stories abound of several cases of suicides by young students which are attributable to the consequences of intake of hard drugs. Some jumped into the Lagos lagoon. Others simply took poisons and died.
Fortunately, Nigeria is not found wanting in the area of policy development on how the theme of hard drugs is textually and contextually formulated.
Nigeria has immensely benefitted from the technical assistance it is getting from the United Nations office on drugs and crime.
The partnership between Nigeria and that United Nations agency is about one of the most effective models that other sectors need to follow.
However, institutionally, Nigeria needs to upgrade the NDLEA to become much more focused on the much needed coordinated war against hard drugs that won’t be basically media centred and mere popularity contest.
But rather, there is the need for better investments in the area of rehabilitation of drugs users. A good institution like the NYSC especially under the current wonderful leadership of Brigadier General Shuaibu Ibrahim should be consulted and a sustainable working partnership entered between NDLEA and NYSC to confront the hydra-headed monster of drugs intakes and trafficking especially because the National Youth Service Corps scheme has become a very successful functional brand in the Country that focuses on youngsters.
Hundreds of thousands of youngsters who are hooked on drugs have had to waste away as criminals and murderers because the Nigerian system has failed them because it has always been focused on being on the front pages of Newspapers than on how many drug users have been rehabilitated.
I have had to read through the executive summary of the policy document prepared by Nigeria on the strategy for combating hard drugs menace that covers the year 2021 to 2025.
I must say that if the beautifully written policy document is effectively implemented, then I believe the majority of our Youths misled into embracing the use of hard drugs, will see the futility in so doing and resolve to stay far away from such life damaging habits and also deny drugs barons the recruitment markets for traffickers.
NDLEA should focus also on enlightening youngsters on the dangers of the use and trafficking of hard drugs making use of credible civil rights platforms such as the one that yours Faithfully coordinates called Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria.
A bird’s eye view or synopsis of this policy document will convince us that our problem is not the lack of written texts but rather the bureaucratic bottlenecks slowing down the institutional mechanisms for the effective delivery of these aims and objectives of combating hard drugs which sociologically impacts Nigeria much more than terrorism.
The terrorism of hard drugs needs to be confronted and NDLEA needs funding and operational independence if we must attain these lofty goals. It can’t be going cap in handing begging for funds and receiving paltry allocation through the justice ministry as if it is a boys Brigade organisation. The job of NDLEA is very critical.
Before I forget, here are snippets of the policy document aforementioned.
“The overall goal of NDCMP 2021–2025 is to improve health and security for everyone living in Nigeria. It is based on the premise that the problems arising from drug supply and consumption are not limited to people who use drugs, but have wider health, social and economic consequences on the family, community and nation. The Plan contains four strategic pillars that culminate in an integrated multi-sectoral strategic and operational plan to comprehensively address drug issues in Nigeria. The pillars are: Supply Reduction; Drug Demand Reduction; Access to Controlled Medicines for Medical and Scientific Purposes; and Governance and Coordination. Each of the strategic pillars is anchored in one or two MDAs of the Government that will be responsible for achieving desired outcomes.”
“The desired result of the Supply Reduction strategic pillar is to reduce production and supply of illicit drugs, including illicit narcotics, precursors, psychotropic substances, and other nationally and internationally controlled drugs. The five desired outcomes are: 1) Increased disruption of drug trafficking; 2) Making drug trade unprofitable; 3) Reduced diversion from licit to illicit uses of narcotics, psychotropic substances and precursors; 4) Reduced illicit production of amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) and new psychoactive substances (NPS); and 5) Reduced cannabis cultivation. NDLEA is the lead agency for this strategic pillar.”
“The strategic pillar on Drug Demand Reduction builds on the sensitization, advocacy, prevention and treatment programmes carried out in the previous NDCMP cycle. The desired outcome is a reduction in demand for drugs, as measured in four areas: 1) Reduced use of drugs (prevention and sensitization); 2) Reduced dependence on drugs (treatment); 3) Reduced harm caused by drug use; and 4) Improved services. NDLEA, FMOH, NAFDAC and NACA are the lead organizations for this pillar.”
The strategic pillar on Access to Controlled Medicines for Medical and Scientific Purposes is meant to address the problem of a lack of availability of controlled medicines for genuine patients and its severe impact on the health and wellness of Nigerians. This pillar, therefore, seeks improved access and appropriate use of controlled medicines, measured by: 1) Increased accessibility, affordability and availability of controlled medicines in public and private health facilities; 2) Rational use of controlled medicines; 3) Health systems strengthening for accessibility, availability and affordability; and 4) Preventing diversion of controlled medicines. FMOH and NAFDAC are the lead organizations for this pillar.”
By and large, I repeat that President Muhammadu Buhari struck the most melodious right Chord on this issue. I so submit. Except to say that I’m still dancing to the melodious tunes of the President’s most philosophically written speech in 6 years.
Emmanuel Onwubiko is head of the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) and was a federal commissioner at the National Human Rights commission of Nigeria.
By Uddin Ifeanyi
Much of the palaver over the recent meeting of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s policy committee was exercised by how well the apex bank is doing its job. Against its primary goal of maintaining price stability, the CBN’s Monetary Policy Committee’s decision to recalibrate its monetary policy rate (MPR) in order to align it with the market invited the most attention.
First, there is the question of what the MPR anchors.
In reality, nothing. Ideally, however, the CBN’s policy rate should transmit price signals through the financial system, influencing saving, borrowing, liquidity, inflation expectations, and in the end, the naira’s exchange rate. It should, in other words, signal the central bank’s intentions. Yet, we have had years in which the MPR stoically remained unchanged even as inflation ran riot, and the naira’s exchange rate came under severe downward pressure.The CBN has regularly papered over this crack with an often-bewildering arsenal of tools — including some eccentric flimflams that it has deployed in recent times. But this only raises further questions as to how useful even these are. Take the cash reserve requirement.
At 45 percent for deposit money banks, it means that nearly half of banks’ qualifying deposits are warehoused with the central bank at any given time. While these sums may not, therefore, be available to build bubbles in the foreign exchange and equity markets, they are not likewise available for lending. Even if we argue that long-term lending ought properly to be funded by equity, banks and not shareholders should bear the burden of financing businesses’ working capital needs. Then, there is the small matter of how the CBN’s cash reserve requirement might be just as orphaned as its policy rate.
Banks raising naira deposits end up paying the CRR tax. In an economy that has witnessed considerable dollarisation — “the process where a country uses a foreign currency (most often the greenback) alongside or completely in place of its own domestic currency” over the years, does it matter that deposits into domiciliary accounts are not CRR compliant? And how?
Might the “dollarisation” phenomenon hold the key to the CBN’s toolkit’s redundancies? Countries formally adopt the dollar in place of their domestic currencies when locals lose faith in the latter. This process restores the stability that struggling economies often find unable to achieve with their currencies and drives investment inflows.
Nigeria’s dollarisation is only partial and barely adjacent. Yet, while the country may not have lost the gains — seigniorage — from printing its own currency that is one consequence of dollarisation, the CBN looks to have partially lost control of the monetary policy space, with the sums that Nigerians increasingly park in their dollar accounts.
There are, thankfully, many ways to regain this control without having to nationalise dollar deposits. Neither the CBN nor the government can talk their way out of this, though. You cannot tell Nigerians to keep their savings in naira while offering them a savings rate below inflation. The smart choice in this circumstance is for domestic economic actors to move their savings into dollars, property, equities, commodities, inventory, or other assets.
Giving Nigerians a reason to save in naira should thus be the central goal of a policy reset. How to do this? We have got to keep inflation low. At 30% year-on-year a while back, the CPI numbers were an outrage. At a little over 15 percent today, it is still doing great injury to the naira. N100 today has roughly the purchasing power of only ₦50 after five years. The solution here goes beyond the CBN setting a credible, explicit medium-term inflation target.
It also transcends the CBN laying out incentive structures that make deviations from this target costly both politically and institutionally. More than this, the national commitment to the CBN not financing fiscal deficits must be religious and total. While this means that monetary policy is no longer subordinate to the federal government’s financing requirements, it must aim at positive real interest rates for savers.
Still a spectre haunts monetary policy in Nigeria. It is unfortunately not in the CBN’s gift to exorcise the nightmare that the federal government’s financing requirements have become.
How do we persuade our public sector boffins that a government that persistently spends more than it can sustainably pay for creates pressure for any of higher taxation, additional borrowing, monetary accommodation, inflation, or the naira’s depreciation? If the naira is only as strong as Nigeria’s balance sheet, then the task of getting both the fiscal and monetary authorities to operate under a common nominal inflation anchor must begin with reducing recurrent expenditure, broadening the tax base instead of increasing the tax rate, returning off-budget borrowing back to the budget, publishing complete fiscal accounts, improving the quality of public investment, establishing a credible medium-term strategy, and ceasing to use the CBN as a piggy bank.
Hopefully, this should help the economy produce more tradable goods and services. Because the naira represents a claim on the economy by anyone holding it, we cannot permanently defend the currency’s exchange rate through interest rates and reserves, if the economy continually uses up more foreign exchange than it earns. In other words, then, the economy must work for the naira to work.
Uddin Ifeanyi, a journalist manqué and retired civil servant, can be reached @IfeanyiUddin.
By Prince Charles Dickson Ph.D
There is an old story about a lawyer who sold his well to a teacher, then returned demanding payment for the water inside it. The teacher smiled. If the water still belonged to the lawyer, he replied, perhaps the lawyer should remove it or pay rent for storing it in somebody else’s well.
Suddenly, the lawyer remembered he had only been joking.It is funny until we recognise ourselves as lawyers.
We tell people with disabilities that public spaces belong to everyone. Then we demand an additional price for entering them.
We give them citizenship, but charge for the ramp. We promise education, but make the classroom unreachable. We proclaim equal opportunity, then construct the doorway too narrow for their wheelchair.That contradiction came home to me when Grace shared her story with me, she titled Public Place Accessible Report for Inclusion. It contained no sentimental appeal. It simply insisted that public places should allow everyone to enter, move, communicate, receive services and participate independently, safely and with dignity.
I listened to it in her voice once as a report. Then, I read it again as an indictment.
Behind every line was somebody’s ordinary day made unnecessarily difficult. A mother arrives at a hospital, already frightened for her child, discovering that the entrance has steps but no ramp. A young man preparing carefully for an interview, only to find his opportunity waiting upstairs without a lift. An older woman confronting a pavement that has forgotten her legs cannot move as quickly as they once did.
These are imagined scenes, but the barriers Grace identified are painfully real. Poorly enforced building standards. Toilets that exclude. Transport that humiliates. Signs people cannot read. Public information people cannot hear. Facilities built without consulting those who will need to use them.
Grace’s intervention mattered because she did not reduce accessibility to a construction problem. Her story and experience understood something profound: every inaccessible entrance is also a message. Sometimes it says, “We did not think of you.” Sometimes, more cruelly, it says, “We thought of you, but you were not worth the expense.”
What does that message do to a child’s heart?
Imagine a girl with cerebral palsy watching other children rush into a school assembly while she waits outside for someone to carry her over the steps. Imagine her learning, year after year, that she must be grateful for help rather than entitled to access. Imagine how quietly a society can teach someone to apologise for existing.
On 3 October 2026, at GlowingStar Empowerment Initiative and Development’s World Cerebral Palsy Day commemoration in Bukuru, I delivered a keynote titled Beyond Therapy: Seeing the Whole Person, Not Just the Condition. Its central argument was simple: a person has cerebral palsy; cerebral palsy does not have the person.
A diagnosis is information, not identity. Therapy is necessary, valuable and sometimes life changing. But therapy is supposed to be a bridge into life, not the whole landscape of living. Beyond treatment are friendships, classrooms, jobs, ambitions, relationships, leadership, laughter, choices and dreams that deserve room to breathe.
We can celebrate a child’s progress in therapy while failing that same child at the school gate. We can praise a parent’s devotion while exhausting that parent with inaccessible transport, expensive care and the endless labour of explaining why their child deserves a chance. We can call ourselves compassionate while our architecture remains indifferent. At the commemoration, parents spoke of stigma, costly therapy and limited support. Their courage was unmistakable, but courage should not be the currency families must spend to secure ordinary human rights.
That was why I argued that admission is not inclusion. Allowing a child through the gate means little if the classroom, teaching methods, toilet, playground or attitudes inside still tell that child to remain on the margins.
And communication must never be confused with intelligence. When someone speaks differently or needs more time, our responsibility is neither impatience nor pity. Ask. Then wait. Listen without finishing their sentences. A human voice does not lose its authority because it travels by an unfamiliar route.
I returned to Grace’s story and noticed how practical her demands were: sensible ramps and handrails, usable toilets, safe pathways, accessible transport, clear signage, Braille, captions, audio information and regular audits. It called for architects, officials and contractors to understand universal design, and for people with disabilities themselves to help plan and evaluate the spaces they use.
Nothing about us without us. That principle is not a decorative language for conferences. It is what stops a well-meaning official from installing a ramp that is too steep, or declaring a school inclusive without asking the students to navigate its corridors.
Nigeria has legal commitments against disability discrimination. Yet a law that cannot travel from the statute book to a bus stop, hospital, workplace or classroom remains a promise stranded on paper. Rights should not require influential relatives, public sympathy or a viral photograph before anyone honours them.
Sometimes, as I said in that keynote, society needs therapy. Our buildings need rehabilitation. Our policies need rehabilitation. Our assumptions, professional habits and careless language need rehabilitation. We must stop asking only how a person can adapt to a hostile environment and begin asking why we made that environment hostile.
I keep thinking about Grace, my newfound friend. As she shared recommendations, their moral weight was larger than the suggestions itself. She reminded me that inclusion often begins when someone refuses to look away from what everyone else has learned to step over. It begins with the uncomfortable decision to measure progress not by the elegance of our speeches, but by who can actually enter the room.
The lawyer in the story wanted to sell the well while keeping its water hostage. Too often, our society offers people with disabilities belonging without access, opportunity without accommodation, dignity without choice. Then it calls every concession generosity.
But the water was never ours to withhold.
Every child deserves more than survival. Every caregiver deserves more than exhaustion. Every adult with a disability deserves the freedom to work, love, contribute and belong without performing gratitude for rights already theirs. The purpose of inclusion is not to make people feel fortunate to be tolerated. It is to build a country where nobody must beg to be considered human.
So, Grace, thank you for disturbing our comfort with something as unromantic, and as revolutionary, as sharing your story with me. May we answer it with budgets, redesigned spaces, enforced standards and genuine listening. May the next child approaching a public doorway find no argument waiting there, only an opening.
By Chiamaka Okafor-Onumah
A child hears that there will be no school tomorrow. The message arrives through a friend, a family WhatsApp group or a video shared online. What should the child do: believe it, forward it or check? That simple moment captures one of the defining challenges of growing up today.
Children are surrounded by information, but they are rarely taught early enough how to question it safely and responsibly.
Media and Information Literacy (MIL) is often discussed as a response to fake news, election rumours or online manipulation.
It is all of these, but it is also something more basic and enduring: the everyday ability to ask where information came from, what evidence supports it, why it was shared and whether it should be passed on.These habits should begin in childhood, when curiosity is strong and the foundations of learning and judgement are being formed.
Children in Nigeria encounter information through family conversations, school announcements, radio, television, books, mobile phones, messaging platforms, social media, online games and, increasingly, artificial intelligence.
This environment brings enormous opportunities. A child can discover a new subject, hear a story from another part of the country or use a digital tool to create something original. The same environment can
carry false health advice, fabricated school notices, altered images, harmful content and messages designed to provoke fear or hostility.
That is the purpose of Young Truth Detectives, an initiative of the Media and Information Literacy and Intercultural Dialogue (MILID) Foundation. Its workbook turns a complex subject into a journey children can understand: six missions that move from recognising information and media to identifying sources, spotting falsehoods, investigating claims and protecting the truth. A child is not asked to master abstract theory. The child is invited to become a detective: ask a question, look for a clue, check the source and seek evidence.
This approach matters because a definition alone does not create a habit. Children need repeated chances to practise. They can learn that a radio or phone is a medium, while the person or organisation behind a message is its source. They can compare a rumour with an official school notice. They can distinguish misinformation, shared by mistake, from disinformation, created or shared deliberately to deceive. They can learn that even a familiar or trusted person may be mistaken, and that checking a claim is an act of care rather than disrespect.
The most useful lesson may be the simplest: stop before sharing. The workbook’s fact-checking questions what happened, when and where, who said it, why it might have been shared, and how we can now give children a practical routine. The final question, “Is it correct?”, leaves room for an honest answer: “I need to check more.” In a culture that rewards speed and instant reaction, teaching a child to wait, ask an adult and verify is a meaningful achievement.
Children should not be expected to investigate dangerous or complicated claims alone. The Facilitator’s Guide places teachers, parents, caregivers and community educators at the centre of the learning process. It offers lesson plans, warm-ups, role-play, reflection, assessment and home activities so that the same ideas can be explored in class and reinforced in family life.
A child who sees adults check a message before forwarding it learns that verification is normal. A child whose questions are welcomed learns that curiosity is a strength.
The guide also recognises that learners do not all begin at the same place. Some children will write answers independently; others will need an adult to read a prompt aloud, invite a spoken response or use a drawing. Age-sensitive activities and familiar Nigerian settings make the lessons more accessible. The aim is not to turn every lesson into a lecture about danger. It is to make critical thought engaging, respectful and useful in ordinary life.
Artificial intelligence makes this work more urgent. AI tools can help children learn and create, but they can also produce convincing text, pictures, audio and video that are inaccurate or invented. The answer cannot be to frighten children away from technology or assume they can identify every manipulation by
sight. Instead, they need a question they can use in different situations: who or what produced this, what evidence supports it, and where else can we check? That habit serves them whether a claim comes from a person, a website or a machine.
For Nigeria, the stakes reach beyond individual screen use. Communities depend on information to make decisions about health, education, safety and public life. False claims can create confusion, damage trust and deepen division. Young people who learn to respect evidence, communicate kindly and correct mistakes without ridicule can contribute to a healthier information environment. MIL does not ask children to distrust everyone. It teaches them to place trust thoughtfully, recognise uncertainty and treat others with dignity.
Media and information literacy belongs alongside reading, writing and other foundational skills. It supports the wider purpose of education: helping children understand the world and participate in it. It also complements the commitment to inclusive, equitable quality education and lifelong learning in Sustainable Development Goal 4.
A child who can read a message but cannot question its source remains vulnerable. A child who can question, verify and communicate responsibly has gained a skill for life.
Schools cannot do this work alone, and parents cannot be expected to know every platform or trend. Young Truth Detectives offers a practical starting point. Schools can make space for short, regular MIL activities. Families can talk about where a message came from before deciding whether to share it. Libraries and community programmes can host detective games and story-based discussions. Facilitators can adapt examples to local languages and experiences while keeping the core questions consistent.
For this to take root, MIL should be treated as a continuing practice rather than a one-off event. Teachers need time and confidence to facilitate discussion; parents need simple prompts they can use without specialist training; and programme designers need to review activities as children’s media habits change.
Partnerships with libraries, schools, community organisations and public educators can help extend the work beyond a single classroom. Consistency matters: children learn best when the same habits are modelled across the places where they live, learn and play.
The measure of success will not be how many lessons children complete. It will be whether, over time, they pause when something sounds startling, ask who made the claim, look for evidence and seek help
when needed. It will be whether they can say, “I was wrong,” or “Let us check together.” These are modest actions, but they help protect children and the people around them.
Every child deserves the tools to navigate the information world with curiosity and care. Inviting children to become Young Truth Detectives does not ask them to carry the burden of fixing the information ecosystem. It gives them age-appropriate ways to take part in it wisely. The questions they learn to ask today can shape the citizens and community members they become tomorrow—and the kind of society they help build.
Chiamaka Okafor-Onumah is Co-founder and Executive Director of MILID Foundation. She can be reached via info@milidfoundation.org
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