"Fancy a kopi and some K4? - TNP 29 June 2015
This coffee shop in Geylang is known for its authentic Chinese dishes and steaming hot buns.
In the evenings, it is a favourite haunt for foreign workers, who eat in the outdoor seating area while watching Chinese period dramas on a big-screen television set.
A two-hour stakeout by The New Paper, acting on a tip-off, found a group of peddlers taking over at one of the outdoor tables, at the rear of the coffee shop, later at night.
What the men, who sounded local, were selling is a deadly mix of narcotics. They include prescription drugs such as codeine and valium as well as hydrocodone, a semi-synthetic opioid formed from codeine and K4, a synthetic variant of cannabis.
The last two drugs are known as new psychoactive substances (NPS), which are designed to mimic such illegal drugs as cannabis, cocaine and ecstasy. They are listed by the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) as Class A controlled drugs.
The activities played out each night at the coffee shop are cause for concern, especially after the findings by the Task Force on Youths and Drugs were announced yesterday. The task force revealed that more "liberal" young people were arrested for drug offences last year. There is also growing concern that young abusers are turning to NPS drugs in the belief that they are more difficult to detect. But the CNB has dispelled this myth.
Last December, the Second Minister for Home Affairs, Mr Masagos Zulkifli, told TNP that abusers below the age of 21 tend to hold three views: "If I try a little bit, I will not get addicted. If I try a little, it will not be detected. There are substances that will not be detected at all."
These are myths, Mr Masagos said. The three drugs of concern are ice (methamphetamine), cannabis and NPS, he said.
During the stakeout earlier this week, TNP observed more than 14 people approaching the pushers at the table to buy drugs. They were all men, except for one couple, and mostly seemed to be in their 20s.
One potential customer was overheard asking about hydrocodone. But before he could finish his sentence, a runner said in Hokkien: "Just go to the table and tell them what you want."
Most transactions lasted less than 10 seconds. Money was handed to a peddler, who would then retrieve drugs from a nearby motorcycle box or a shelf behind the table and hand them to the buyer.
A source had told TNP that K4 was sold there in small packets for between $30 and $60 depending on the quantity.
TNP went back to the coffee shop on another afternoon and asked a youth sitting at the table whether we could buy K4. Without looking up from his mobile phone, he said curtly: "Come back at night."
Those who consume or possess NPS drugs can be jailed up to 10 years and fined $20,000, or both.
Those who traffick, manufacture, import or export NPS drugs can be jailed for at least five years and given five strokes of the cane."
I AM SHOCK to learn that such activities CAN BE so OPEN in Singapore!!
Lessons for me are:
1. NO WAY we can accept a Singapore that permits such blatant display of disregard for law enforcement agencies and personnel when illegal drug paddlers profit as if they are doing legitimate businesses!!;
2. IF even newspapers folks CAN see these drug paddlers without TOO MUCH efforts, SURELY the laws enforcement officers can SPOT them and ARREST THEM and put them away for a longest time permitted by the laws! YES? IF NOT, WHY NOT?;
3. forget about trying to change the youths who want to try these drugs with the attitude that: 'I won't get hooked' as medical science CLEARLY showed that YOUR BODY will become dependent and addict to the substance. You can be in control ONLY IF you are mentally strong naturally and deliberately. MOST, by empirical evidence ARE NOT mentally STRONG enough to resist. Those who fell find it VERY HARD to kick the addictions. So, I rather we ERRED on the caution side and ERADICATE such drugs and ELIMINATE the 'let me try as I can stop anytime' delusional excuses!
I HOPE we will soon CLEAR the kopi and some K4 shops THOROUGHLY and RELENTLESSLY!! Such acts and crimes deserve NO MERCY. Such acts and crimes deserve MAXIMUM punishment!
This coffee shop in Geylang is known for its authentic Chinese dishes and steaming hot buns.
In the evenings, it is a favourite haunt for foreign workers, who eat in the outdoor seating area while watching Chinese period dramas on a big-screen television set.
A two-hour stakeout by The New Paper, acting on a tip-off, found a group of peddlers taking over at one of the outdoor tables, at the rear of the coffee shop, later at night.
What the men, who sounded local, were selling is a deadly mix of narcotics. They include prescription drugs such as codeine and valium as well as hydrocodone, a semi-synthetic opioid formed from codeine and K4, a synthetic variant of cannabis.
The last two drugs are known as new psychoactive substances (NPS), which are designed to mimic such illegal drugs as cannabis, cocaine and ecstasy. They are listed by the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) as Class A controlled drugs.
The activities played out each night at the coffee shop are cause for concern, especially after the findings by the Task Force on Youths and Drugs were announced yesterday. The task force revealed that more "liberal" young people were arrested for drug offences last year. There is also growing concern that young abusers are turning to NPS drugs in the belief that they are more difficult to detect. But the CNB has dispelled this myth.
Last December, the Second Minister for Home Affairs, Mr Masagos Zulkifli, told TNP that abusers below the age of 21 tend to hold three views: "If I try a little bit, I will not get addicted. If I try a little, it will not be detected. There are substances that will not be detected at all."
These are myths, Mr Masagos said. The three drugs of concern are ice (methamphetamine), cannabis and NPS, he said.
During the stakeout earlier this week, TNP observed more than 14 people approaching the pushers at the table to buy drugs. They were all men, except for one couple, and mostly seemed to be in their 20s.
One potential customer was overheard asking about hydrocodone. But before he could finish his sentence, a runner said in Hokkien: "Just go to the table and tell them what you want."
Most transactions lasted less than 10 seconds. Money was handed to a peddler, who would then retrieve drugs from a nearby motorcycle box or a shelf behind the table and hand them to the buyer.
A source had told TNP that K4 was sold there in small packets for between $30 and $60 depending on the quantity.
TNP went back to the coffee shop on another afternoon and asked a youth sitting at the table whether we could buy K4. Without looking up from his mobile phone, he said curtly: "Come back at night."
Those who consume or possess NPS drugs can be jailed up to 10 years and fined $20,000, or both.
Those who traffick, manufacture, import or export NPS drugs can be jailed for at least five years and given five strokes of the cane."
I AM SHOCK to learn that such activities CAN BE so OPEN in Singapore!!
Lessons for me are:
1. NO WAY we can accept a Singapore that permits such blatant display of disregard for law enforcement agencies and personnel when illegal drug paddlers profit as if they are doing legitimate businesses!!;
2. IF even newspapers folks CAN see these drug paddlers without TOO MUCH efforts, SURELY the laws enforcement officers can SPOT them and ARREST THEM and put them away for a longest time permitted by the laws! YES? IF NOT, WHY NOT?;
3. forget about trying to change the youths who want to try these drugs with the attitude that: 'I won't get hooked' as medical science CLEARLY showed that YOUR BODY will become dependent and addict to the substance. You can be in control ONLY IF you are mentally strong naturally and deliberately. MOST, by empirical evidence ARE NOT mentally STRONG enough to resist. Those who fell find it VERY HARD to kick the addictions. So, I rather we ERRED on the caution side and ERADICATE such drugs and ELIMINATE the 'let me try as I can stop anytime' delusional excuses!
I HOPE we will soon CLEAR the kopi and some K4 shops THOROUGHLY and RELENTLESSLY!! Such acts and crimes deserve NO MERCY. Such acts and crimes deserve MAXIMUM punishment!
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