By Betty Luke
Isiolo County, Kenya: Mustapha Yaka is elated as he embarks on his usual business hawking bottles of locally made disinfectant and antiseptics liquid in Isiolo town.
The 34-year-old almost lost his life as he struggled with drug abuse for twelve years, moments he terms as the most horrific in his life.
Poverty at home had pushed him into the streets where he hoped for a better life only for things to get worse and he found himself struggling with hard drugs the majority of which he had never heard of before.
“I thought life would be easier. I was running away from lack and sleepless nights occasioned by hunger back at home. Life was tough,” he says during a recent interview.
Idleness, stress, and lack of income pushed him into solvent abuse so as to ‘fit’ in with a group of young boys he had met in the streets and who he says would have kicked him out had he not complied.
Solvent abuse involves the deliberate inhalation of volatile substances with an aim of intoxicating oneself.
“I thought sniffing would provide a long-term solution to the challenges I was facing but nothing seemed to work out and so I graduated to smoking cigarettes and later to bhang,” says Yaka.
Within three years, the young man had become an addict, and this time round he had graduated to using a cheaper version of heroin popularly known as kete, kucha, mzigo, or dragon.
Youth leader Salad Tadicha displays some of the products he hawks in Isiolo town. PHOTO/BETTY LUKE.
Kete, which has slowly flooded the drug market in Isiolo town.
‘Kete’ is known to be a quick solution to hunger by addicts, IT IS ALLEGED IT kills appetite allowing one to GO for long hours without food.
It is usually placed under the lower lip and leads to bleeding of the person’s rectum which causes men to experience menses-like bleeding while its long-term effects are fatal.
“Majority of young people prefer Kete because it is cheap and readily available compared to other types of heroin that are damn expensive,” he reveals.
The desire to satisfy an addiction, with no reliable source of income led him to engage in criminal activities including pickpocketing to get money for drugs.
Yaka confides, “kete ndio baba yao, ukianza kutumia kuwacha ni kazi,” loosely translated to Kete is more addictive than other drugs, once you start using it you will require a lot of effort to stop.
The journey to recovery
A group of recovering addicts had last year appealed to the county government to help them quit addiction by stocking the local health facilities with methadone, a synthetic opioid, used to treat addiction to heroin.
The high rates of unemployment and economic shocks occasioned by the ongoing drought and Coronavirus pandemic have been blamed for the indulgence of many youths in drug use with many of them seeking a solution to their problems.
A 2021 research by the National Authority for the Campaign against Alcohol and Drug Abuse (NACADA) revealed a growing market of heroin in the country, especially in Isiolo, Kiambu, Uasin Gishu, Kisumu, Nairobi, Nakuru counties and the Coastal region.
The drug is allegedly sneaked into Isiolo from neighboring Ethiopia through the Moyale-Isiolo highway.
Soon after Yaka got married, he realized that he could not sustain the needs of his family as he had no stable source of income and was still struggling to maintain his addiction.
“I had gotten into menial jobs and was struggling to balance my little income between family needs and drugs. I suddenly realized that the kSh100 I was taking home was not enough for even a single meal. I slowly made up my mind that I would stop taking drugs,” he recalls.
The journey was tough. He recalls idle days when he would decide to pass by a local drug dealer, take some on credit, and promise to pay back in the evening when he had made some money from loading and offloading farm produce in a nearby market.
Intervention
It is in his struggle to quit an addiction, Yaka met Halima Osman of People Like Us, a community-based organization, that was seeking to engage drug users as a way of helping them fight addiction.
The group was formed at the height of Covid-19 with an aim of economically uplifting widows and widowers whose spouses were killed in inter-community clashes in the county. The members are in the detergent and disinfectant-making business which they sell to public amenities including hospitals, schools, and even to individuals in an effort to earn a living.
Their desire to take part in the fight against drug and substance abuse pushed them to incorporate victims of drug abuse as a way of helping them reform while also keeping them engaged to ensure they do not get back to addiction.
“We identified some young men and women, who were drug addicts, to help us sell our products and in the process, they stay engaged and also earn a little income out of it,” she says.
The women-led group makes detergents that include hand wash liquids, toilet cleaners, sanitizers, hair shampoo, and bleaching agents in hundreds of liters and issues some to the ex-drug addicts to hawk around Isiolo town.
Mr. Yaka sells at least five liters of disinfectant liquids every day, making a profit of between kSh400 to kSh600 every day which is enough to comfortably support his family. His main customers are barber shops in town and on the outskirts of Isiolo town who he says have been key supports in his recovery process.
“Business was not an easy task before because people around knew me as a drug user so some thought I wanted to con them but with time they have embraced my product and are using it in barber shops and at home,” he notes.
The entrepreneur can comfortably raise the rent of Ksh3000, food, and fees for his children schooling at Wabera Primary School, and even save some little money for emergencies. “I have tasted the fruits of freedom since I joined People Like Us. Had I not met them, I would have lost my family and possibly gone back to drugs,” he jokingly narrates.
Yaka is among ten youths currently under the program that Osman says seeks to ensure zero drug use in the region although several factors limit them.
Isiolo Mobile Hawkers Association chair Salad Tadicha opines that the only way through which the government and non-governmental organizations can help fight drug use and addiction among young people is by ensuring that they are actively engaged.
Mr. Mustapha Yaka (in a red hat) and Amum Abaruka display some of the products they hawk. Both are reformed drug addicts currently hawking detergent in Isiolo town. PHOTO/BETTY LUKE
He says when one is idle and has a lot of responsibilities that they cannot fulfill due to limited resources, then they are tricked into using drugs that act as a short-term solution. The youth leader, who is also engaged by the women’s group, says although the local and national government has had several policies meant to curb drug abuse, a lot is yet to be done.
He makes between kSh4000 and kSh8000 monthly enough to sustain his family.
“The leaders should now focus on the real victims from the village level and cease the board room meetings in big towns at the expense of the suffering youths. We are losing young people every day and if nothing will be done then we will no longer be talking about young people especially here in Isiolo,” he says in an interview. Apart from economic support, the group also morally supports the youths to ensure they are not lured back into their initial ways.
Former County Development Officer Fatima Halkano who is in charge of the ex-addict counseling says some of them are easy to deal with while others are yet to completely quit drug use.
She says had there been enough resources they would have ventured to other income-generating activities to ensure they are fully engaged. “Lack of adequate resources derail our efforts but we keep talking to them and also monitor their progress and we listen to them to ensure they do not go back to the evil ways out of loneliness,” says Ms. Halkano.
People Like Us chair Mr. Hussein Mohammed says although they seek to recruit more drug users into the initiative, lack of resources remains a key challenge.
“The ingredients that we use to make the detergents that we give to the youths to sell are too expensive and we cannot buy much. The little we buy can only be distributed to a few of them and to fight addiction we first need to ensure the victims are fully engaged,” he says. The group has appealed for financial support to enable them to support more victims of drug abuse across the vast county.
This publication was produced with the financial support of the European Union. Its contents are the sole responsibility of Betty Luke and do not necessarily reflect the views of the European Union.
