A youth’s lobby group in Nakuru County in collaboration with stakeholders has established a drug and alcohol abuse counselling centre aimed at reclaiming the lives of local youth who are addicted. Mawanga Youth Agenda Chairman Antony Waweru told this writer in his office today at Mawanga estate business centre along Nakuru-Subukia road that the programme that has already kicked off in its first phase involves mapping and survey to identify victims of the problem. He said it will officially be commissioned by the National Campaign Against Drug Abuse (NACADA) chairman John Mututho on April 25 this year in the area. According to Waweru the problems associated with drug and alcohol abuse and addiction were prevalent among the local youth and there was an urgent need by stakeholders including the government to take action against the menace. ‘’As a community based youth organisation, our objectives are to initiate programmes that will add value to the lives of the local youths,” he said. He added, “Many youths who are hooked to drugs and alcohol are facing many other challenges in life and we feel we can help in solving them by first helping them ditch using drugs and consuming alcohol irresponsibly. We are happy that the government and other stakeholders are willing to support us implement the programme.’’ He said collaborating with community based groups to fight the problem of drug abuse was among their objectives.

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