A drug rehabilitation activist has faulted Malay-Muslims for turning a blind eye to drug addiction when it was largely youth from the community who fall prey to the menace.

Commenting on the glaring number of new drug addicts identified by the government (1,903 a month) and the predominance of Malays who made up the vast majority (66.14 percent), he said that many young people, especially Malays, suffered from a sense of aimlessness and alienation.

He said this indicates the failure of Islamic organisations to address these concerns, as there were only a handful of Islamic groups nationwide that addressed the drug growing problem among Muslim youth.

"Why aren't mosques utilised as support groups for after-treatment of recovering addicts? If you merely highlight the main mosques and the community surrounding each, you have a potentially large community to rally around the project," he added.

He also said it is high time the government approached the drug problem differently but warned that harsher laws would not have a positive effect.

The activist, a former drug addict himself, told malaysiakini recently that proposals for longer sentences and caning for relapse cases will prove ineffectual.

Military approach

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the activist said the failure of the government to rehabilitate drug addicts derived in part from the treatment at government-supported rehabilitation centres (Pusat Serenti), consisting of haphazard methodologies dominated by the military approach.

"It is clear that the 'Serenti approach' is that of detention, not of rehabilitation. If it is merely detention, then they are merely 'doing time'. They are not coming out changed," he added.

According to statistics revealed last week by the National Drugs Agency, more than 50 percent of the 26,739 addicts registered within the last seven months in rehabilitation centers nationwide were 'relapses'. Foreign reports claim higher figures of 70-75 percent.

"The government centres are not using a model that has been proven and replicated in any Asean or European country that can be implemented in the Malaysian context. It is pretty much a combination of approaches dominated by the army style with military drills," said the activist.

"There are four general aspects of the human being, and the physical aspect is only one of them. Sadly, the others such as the spiritual, emotional, mental aspects are not taken as the norm," he added.

He said the government somewhat acknowledged the non-governmental organisations' (NGOs) call for a change in tactics, particularly that of mandatory registration of those identified to be illegal drug users in Serenti centres.

"Kudos to the government. We have heard the government will open several more centres where there is a change of approach. In these centers, drug addicts wil not be compelled to register, but will volunteer to come," he said.

However, he said to make any real progress on the battle against the drug problem, the government needed to incorporate NGOs in their efforts as very few non-governmental Serenti centres received any support from the government.

"Why aren't we looking at this problem together? Why don't you include NGOs. We don't have a political agenda, so why don't you incorporate others into your treatment efforts?" he asked.

He said governmental after-care programmes, in particular, were weak as the community was not involved in order to rally support around the recovering addict, whereas private organisations suffered from lack of governmental support.

"In most cases, recovering addicts escape into the woodwork. The government's after-care treatment is very weak. We want the government to acknowledge the NGOs and say, 'Take these few people into your programme, and we will pay for the logistics, accommodation, and such,'" he added.

Three strokes of 'rotan'

Under current legislation, relapse addicts can be imprisoned five to seven years with three strokes of the cane. There are proposals, however, that the sentences and caning be increased as a punishment for 'recurring' drug-addicts.

Commenting on the proposal, the activist said such punitive measures were futile and 'vindictive' as hardcore addicts had already suffered tremendous abuse from their addiction.

"Drug addiction is a scourge. These are emaciated, hardened people who have already suffered years of physical and mental torment, and you want to punish them some more with more strokes of the cane?" he asked.

He said the problem was the government's 'criminal approach' to the problem, whereas the crimes arising out drug addiction was peculiar to it and thus needed to be tackled using the 'social-disease model'.

"Nobody chooses to be an addict. These are people who experimented and got addicted. There are people who can stop at one drink, but for the person who is addicted, he cannot stop.

"According to neuroscience, and this has been proven medically, that 'sliding door' cannot be closed. If you take this disease-model, you take away the punitive basis of the measures," he added.