A three-day sub-regional seminar on a joint strategy and operation plan in the fight against the consumption of drugs in schools began on Wednesday at the Baobab Holiday Resort Hotel in Bijilo.

Jointly organised by the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (ISESCO) and The Gambia National Commission for UNESCO (NATCOM), the workshop brought together participants from The Gambia, Senegal, Guinea Bissau, Guinea Conakry and Ivory Coast.

Delivering the welcoming remarks, Sukai Bojang, secretary general of NATCOM, said the purpose of the seminar was to draw up a strategy on the use of narcotics in schools. According to Mrs Bojang, countries represented in the seminar have great hopes on the group of 20 youths who are being trained to disseminate what have been concluded at the workshop.

For her part, Dr Fatoumata Sesay-Joof, vice-chairperson of The Gambia National Commission for UNESCO, recalled that the sub-regional workshop held in Guinea Conakry last year, provided a platform for participants to look at the use of narcotics, namely tobacco, cannabis, alcohol and cocaine in schools. According to Joof, many scientific studies have shown that health problems associated with tobacco use are correlated with the number of years and amount of use.

"The earlier young people begin to smoke, the more likely they are to continue smoking as adults and an early onset of tobacco use is also associated with heavier use in adulthood," she said, and added that the average age at which people begin smoking is 13 years and that only 10 percent of tobacco users begin to do so after the age of 20.
"The developed world, especially the United States, spends billions of dollars annually on school based drug education programmes and the developing countries do not have enormous resources to initiate such individual programmes," she noted.

She added that ISESCO’S intervention in bringing together member countries of the sub-region to draw up a strategy to address the problem of substance abuse is timely.



Supreme Court session starts Monday

The first Supreme Court session in 2009 will commence on Monday, 16 March, 2009, a press release from the Office of the Chief Justice has revealed.

According to the release, the two-week sittings of the court will deal with eight matters- one criminal and six civil appeals plus a constitutional review case. The session, led by Hon. Chief Justice Abdou Kareem Savage, will comprise five other judges: Hon. Justice Irene Mambilima, deputy chief justice of Zambia; Hon. Justice Niki Tobi, Nigerian supreme court judge; Hon. Justice Victor Dotse and Hon. Justice Professor Samuel Kofi Date-Bah, supreme court judges from Ghana; and Hon. Justice Ade Renner-Thomas, retired chief justice of Sierra Leone.


Seminar on consumption of drugs in school kicks-off

by Asanatou Bojang

A three-day sub-regional seminar on a joint strategy and operation plan in the fight against the consumption of drugs in schools began on Wednesday at the Baobab Holiday Resort Hotel in Bijilo.

Jointly organised by the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (ISESCO) and The Gambia National Commission for UNESCO (NATCOM), the workshop brought together participants from The Gambia, Senegal, Guinea Bissau, Guinea Conakry and Ivory Coast. Delivering the welcoming remarks, Sukai Bojang, secretary general of NATCOM, said the purpose of the seminar was to draw up a strategy on the use of narcotics in schools.

According to Mrs Bojang, countries represented in the seminar have great hopes on the group of 20 youths who are being trained to disseminate what have been concluded at the workshop. For her part, Dr Fatoumata Sesay-Joof, vice-chairperson of The Gambia National Commission for UNESCO, recalled that the sub-regional workshop held in Guinea Conakry last year, provided a platform for participants to look at the use of narcotics, namely tobacco, cannabis, alcohol and cocaine in schools.

According to Joof, many scientific studies have shown that health problems associated with tobacco use are correlated with the number of years and amount of use. "The earlier young people begin to smoke, the more likely they are to continue smoking as adults and an early onset of tobacco use is also associated with heavier use in adulthood," she said, and added that the average age at which people begin smoking is 13 years and that only 10 percent of tobacco users begin to do so after the age of 20.

"The developed world, especially the United States, spends billions of dollars annually on school based drug education programmes and the developing countries do not have enormous resources to initiate such individual programmes," she noted.
She added that ISESCO’S intervention in bringing together member countries of the sub-region to draw up a strategy to address the problem of substance abuse is timely.