HELP EX-ADDICTS, MOSQUE URGED

MOSQUES in Johor are encouraged to help former drug addicts, who have been disowned by their families, to get back into society.

Johor Religious Department director Abd Rahman Jaffar said former addicts had received skills training while under rehabilitation and these skills could be used even in mosques.

With a skill and job in hand, he said, former drug addicts would be less likely to return to their old habit.

"Some former addicts may not be accepted by their families, so mosques can play a role to help them. This will prevent them from going back to their old haunts," he said.

"We should let them stay inside the mosque compound, where they could help with landscaping, farming and keeping the compound clean," Abd Rahman said at the closing of a workshop at the Muar Narcotics Rehabilitation Centre recently.

Abd Rahman also reminded the inmates not to miss the opportunity offered by the centre to rehabilitate themselves.

Also present were the National Anti-Drug Agency assistant director Mizra Hilmi Abu Bakar and the centre commandant V. M. Asok Kumar.

Some 50 participants from mosques in Johor attended the workshop, which also included recreational activities with the centre's inmates.

SOURCE: NST JOHOR BUZZ, 22 APRIL 2009