Almost every day, the GDN publishes stories about foreigners sentenced to extended years in jail for smuggling drugs into the kingdom. In the issue of May 6, two Asians were reported jailed for 15 years because they smuggled marijuana. On page 10, two Asians were caught smuggling narcotics in teddy bears. They were sent to the High Criminal Court. As usual this is followed by a long sequence of trials which may take years followed by jailing them for tens of years.
There are two aspects to such endless episodes of jailing thousands of people in prisons. The first is that the demand for such drugs in Bahrain should be tackled by the government. The culture of narcotics consumption is a foreign-influenced hobby for the idle and rich strata of society.
These social dilemmas can be solved by the conscription of jobless and inept youngsters in military to condition them and teach them discipline. Heavy teaching programmes should be rendered to young to recycle the jobless in new labour and technical work that Bahrain needs.
Second is the jailing of endless numbers in prisons for endless years is economically a disaster. It is better for the economy’s well-being to confiscate the drugs and deport those who had them immediately. Some will say that such a lenient approach may encourage such crimes. Then the law should be changed and capital punishment for drug smuggling can stop this behaviour immediately. Jailing hundreds costs millions through expensive legal processes and logistics rendered to maintain the well-being of inmates.
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