Fiapre (B/A), May 13, GNA - Mr Justice Benjamin Osei, a circuit court Judge at Fiapre, near Sunyani, has expressed concern about the increasing rate of narcotic drug cases in the Brong Ahafo Region. Mr Osei expressed the concern in an interview with the Ghana News Agency after sentencing a 30-year-old farmer, Mohammed Adams, to 10 years in jail in hard labour for possessing marijuana. Adams was arrested by Customs officials on board a Metro Mass Transport bus on the Techiman-Kumasi highway for possessing two boxes of the leaves.

Within a fortnight, the court had sentenced four farmers arrested on the same road for possessing Indian hemp to a total of 40 years' imprisonment. Mr Osei noted that the arrests and conviction had not deterred the farmers from engaging in the practice. He called on the regional security committee and chiefs to dialogue with farmers to desist from the practice and rather engage in other economic ventures.

"The war against the drug will not be a problem since the areas of cultivation are well known," he said and mentioned Nsawkaw, Seikwa, and Badu in Tain district and Subinso in Wenchi district places where the drug was cultivated on a large scale.

Mr Osei said the farmers needed to be educated about the adverse effects of the drug on the youth, adding that this could motivate them to allow their farms to be destroyed and compensation paid to them by government.

"Indian hemp is very dangerous and has been a major contributor to criminal activities such as robbery, defilement and rape in the country," he said. Mr Osei stressed the need for a special task force to patrol identified areas and asked the people to volunteer information on the existence of such farms. He urged the regional security committee to take a serious view of the situation and outline appropriate measures to check the cultivation of the drug in the region, which he added, had become a major source of supply in the country.