The DA has called for the narcotics unit to be reinstated after it emerged from a UN report that the country is the key in producing tik and that dagga and heroin use has escalated.
The UN World Drug Report, released on Thursday, says dagga is the drug most people seek treatment for in Africa.
SA produces large amounts of tik, which is smuggled through the southern African region.
According to the report, more than 1 percent of the SA population uses the highly addictive drug, but 64 percent of people seeking help are in rehab for dagga use.
Mike Waters, DA spokesman on social development, says he will write to Minister of Social Development Bathabile Dlamini asking her to take urgent steps to promote, within the cabinet, the reinstatement of the narcotics bureau.
He would also like to see an anti-drug unit within SAPS, separate from the narcotics bureau, which would specialise in anti-drug patrolling and investigations as well as tightening restrictions on bail for drug offences.
Waters also wants drug master- plans for all government departments and a strategy review committee.
He says anyone convicted on a charge of drug dealing should not be eligible for bail if arrested on the same charge.
According to the report, dagga and heroin are the two main substances contributing to demand for treatment for illicit drug use in Africa, with 64 percent of all treatment for drug use reportedly provided for disorders related to dagga use.
Sarah Fisher, executive director of the Substance Misuse, Advocacy, Research and Training (Smart) organisation said: “Codeine is an opioid and sold over the counter in SA; we have no idea how many people are having problems as a result of this.”
While tik used to be imported into the countries of southern Africa, now it is being produced here and smuggled to neighbouring states.
In 2010, an increase in heroin users was observed in south Asia and in east and south-east Asia in particular, but experts from many African countries also reported a perceived increase in the use of heroin.
The UN report warns that a “much more marked growth in the number of illicit drug users can be expected in developing countries”.
This suggests that a relative shift of the burden of the global drug problem from the developed countries to the currently developing countries will continue over the coming decades.
Cape Argus