ONE in four students in Sarawak’s most northern district of Lawas have been found to be taking drugs, as revealed in a survey by the national anti-drug agency (Agensi Antidadah Kebangsaan).

The survey, conducted between January and March, revealed that 23 students out of 99 the agency picked randomly for urine tests tested positive for drugs, according to the agency’s state director Katrina Ujin.

As worrying as that may sound, the figures are still “much lower” than the numbers who tested positive over the same period last year, said Ujin.

The result however seemed to vindicate claims made – and often ignored – by the Lawas representative in the state legislative assembly, PKR’s Baru Bian, of the drug problem in this district of about 35,000 people.

Even as recent as last November, the Ba Kelalan assemblyman again spoke out about the problem after a secondary school teacher was arrested on suspicion of being a Syabu (methamphetamine) drug pusher.

Baru said the arrest was “only the tip of the iceberg”, and raised the question of whether or not the teacher was selling drugs to students.

Baru, who had been speaking of the drug scourge in the district both inside and outside the state assembly since 2012 once claimed that syabu was freely sold in the villages.

Minister of Welfare, Woman and Community Wellbeing Fatimah Abdullah reacted to the agency’s finding by saying the government could no longer “be in denial mode”.

“We have to accept the fact that drug dealers are now targeting students,” she said. – April 29, 2017.