Overhaul of UAE drug laws considered

Officials tell The National all concerned authorities have been asked to evaluate current anti-narcotics laws and suggest reforms.

ABU DHABI // An overhaul of the nation’s drug laws could mean offenders no longer face prison sentences.

Anti-drugs officials told The National that Sheikh Saif bin Zayed, the Minister of Interior and Deputy Prime Minister, had ordered all concerned authorities to evaluate current anti-narcotics laws and suggest reforms.

Generally, the overhaul will consider new methods to punish or treat convicts, especially repeat offenders, such as social and community services.

Brig Gen Maktoum al Sharifi, the head of Abu Dhabi Capital Police, welcomed the idea of reforms, saying the law should not consider a drug offender a criminal, as it currently does.

“A drug addict is a sick person and he should be treated as such,” Brig Gen al Sharifi said. “Alternative punishment would be more effective. A drug offender could be just an addict, not a criminal, but after locking him up for years he could come out involved in crimes such as stealing, drug dealing, et cetera.”

Alternative punishments police have proposed include community service, such as cleaning the streets, schools or voluntary work.

Major reforms proposed by rehabilitation centres include allowing family members to turn in drug offenders to avoid prosecution. Currently, only if abusers themselves seek rehabilitation will they avoid going to jail.

“Addicts would be under the influence of drugs and would not think clearly, so those around them should be allowed to help them,” said Dr Hamad al Ghafiri, the general director of the National Rehabilitation Centre (NRC) in Abu Dhabi. “We want to encourage people to seek treatment, so we should assure them that they will not face prison for doing so.”

Another major reform, Dr al Ghafiri said, would be the creation of a data-tracking system that would link clinics across the nation to avoid prescription “shopping”. He said many patients had used old prescriptions for addiction-treatment medicines provided by the NRC to obtain extra doses by visiting different clinics across the country. Abu Dhabi, he said, had already linked its clinics and pharmacies.

Experts said drug offenders were usually treated as criminals rather than victims or even patients.

Saeed Abdul Baseer, the Chief Justice of Abu Dhabi Criminal Court of First Instance, said that he would prefer to send patients to rehabilitation centres or give them lesser sentences, but that he was restricted by the law. The minimum sentence for drug crimes is four years – a regulation especially punitive to expatriates who cannot be admitted to rehabilitation centres.

"I would be very happy to give them lesser sentence or send them to rehabilitation centres," the chief justice said. "It is not an easy thing to sentence a young offender to four years in prison. But I have to follow the law."
Faiza Moussa, a lawyer who deals with drug cases, said jail sentences were not an effective deterrent.

“Drug addiction is more of a psychological problem,” Mrs Moussa said. “I dealt with defendants who lapsed too many times. They go to prison and then they are released, they would have been properly coached or rehabilitated.”

She suggested toxins should be removed from the body of drug offenders before considering any punishment. After removing toxins, she said, the offender should be referred to a specialist, who would try to turn them away from lapsing back into drug use. She also suggested jails should have workshops to train inmates on how to be a productive member of society after leaving prison.

"Most of drug addicts are either unemployed, uneducated or with social problems," she said. "If they teach him a certain profession to start a business after they leave prison, I think most of them would not return to drugs."

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